


Gone in 60 Seconds

by Darmys



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Movie, Cars, Cole Dies, Fanvids, Fast Cars, M/M, Referenced Cas/Others, SPN Movie Big Bang 2019, Stealing Fast Cars, Underage Drinking, Vomiting, bad language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-14 05:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 39,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19266652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darmys/pseuds/Darmys
Summary: Convinced by his mother walk away from his life, and save his younger brother, Dean left Seattle six years ago. Only to be told on a Monday, Sam’s taken a job from Richard Roman: Local stolen-car broker, and all-round bad guy. And Sam’s fumbled the job. Now Dean has until 8am Friday morning to get 50 high-end cars on a container ship, or Roman will kill Sam.Starring:Dean Winchester as Memphis RainesSam Winchester as Kip Rainesand Baby as Eleanor.





	1. TRAILER

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my entry in the [SPN Movie Big Bang](https://spnmoviebigbang.tumblr.com). I have had a ball writing this fic and hanging out with all the other Authors and Artists on the Bangs Discord Server.
> 
> I want to thank our Directors (Mods). I can't express how pleasurable these three lovely people have been to work with. [MalMuses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MalMuses/pseuds/MalMuses), [jscribbles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jscribbles/pseuds/jscribbles), and [AmandaCanzo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmandaCanzo/pseuds/AmandaCanzo) have been there holding hands, making jokes, encouraging and cheering. They're awesome, I love them all.
> 
> My darling Lady Fox jumped in my car and let me take her for a ride. All mistakes in this story are my own, none of them are hers, and if you find any, that just shows how good I am at hiding them from her. But seriously, I love working with this Fox, she brightens my day, my inbox and my PMs. I adore her to bitses and owe her more wine than my bank account will let me buy.
> 
> RavensCat my beautiful artist. I think I sat in Discord repeating "Really?" "Seriously?" "Really?" when I found out you claimed my story. I could not believe, I'm still in awe that you picked my story.
> 
> And now in the words of my adorable Alpha reader [Kazshero](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kazshero/pseuds/kazshero) "Buckle up and enjoy the ride."

  
  



	2. THEN

###### Thursday morning, 2nd January, 1997.

The streets were empty, low fog skimming the sidewalks below a grey sky and lending the streets of Queen Anne a fuzzy and surreal feel. The block was free of parked cars with the exception of All Cock ‘n’ Balls, a black 1967 Chevrolet Impala four door sedan.

Through the mist, a lightening sky heralded an impending dawn. Someone approached, his confident stride slowing as he came close. He took a wide berth around the car, looking her over with adoring eyes. He reached out, almost touching her flank when another car pulled up beside him.

“Are you about to kneel down in adulation?” Victor asked, leaning out of the Firebird’s open window. He threw up his hand in a calming gesture at Dean’s heated look. “I know, I know. It’s Baby.” He drove forward slowly, stopping a few blocks down the road.

Dean checked the surrounding area, making sure he was alone. He pulled a slim-jim from the deep inner pocket of his leather jacket, slipped it down into the door and with a knowledgeable movement unlocked and opened the door.

He slipped into the driver’s seat and a screwdriver replaced the slim-jim in his hand. He popped off the butterfly to the ignition and stripped the mechanism. Dean pressed a small socket-like gizmo into the ignition and with a twist of his wrist the Impala’s engine roared to life. The whole dance took less than five breaths.

Dean pulled a cassette tape from his left pocket and inserted it into the deck while he pulled the door closed behind him. As he pulled out onto the road two things happened. A look of pure pleasure washed over his face and Led Zeppelin’s _‘Ramble On’_ filled the car.

As he came up on Victor, the Firebird pulled out in front of him and a block later Gabriel’s 1969 Z28 Camaro slotted in behind. Dean’s friends provided escort fore and aft.

As _‘Ramble On’_ switched to _‘Trampled Under Foot’_ a police car appeared behind them. Gabriel pulled out of formation and sped ahead as Victor and Dean came to a stop at the signed intersection. Flashing lights took off after him, pulling Gabriel over on the other side of the intersection.

Victor and Dean continue on their way as the police officer exited his vehicle. Gabriel’s distraction worked. “Problem officer?” Gabe asked when the cop reached his open window.

“Please step out of the vehicle. You’re being placed under arrest.”

“For running a stop sign?” Gabe scoffed, still sitting in his vehicle.

A smile spread over the officer’s face. “For grand theft auto.”

Four unmarked police vehicles came out of nowhere, lights flashing, tailing the Impala and Firebird. The Firebird’s brakes flashed as Victor double tapped the pedal enough to light his rear up without bleeding any of his speed.

Dean flicked his headlights back and in unison they sped away. Sirens sounded behind them and the chase was on. Dean pulled up beside the Firebird, signaling Victor to split up.

At the next intersection Dean continued straight while Victor turned right. Two cars followed him but Dean picked up a third lying in wait off in a side street. Dean turned up the music as he wove through side streets, cursing when he somehow picked up another two police cruisers.

He found a straightway and piled on the speed, grinning as the car powered ahead. But somehow the police had formed a road block ahead of him. Dean didn’t understand how they’d deployed so fast.

Five cars behind him, three and wooden barrier in front. Dean floored the Impala and she surged forward. At the last moment, as the cops ran to the sides, Dean shifted the car to neutral, turned the wheel hard left and pulled the hand brake, letting the car slide. He straightened the wheel and as soon as her nose was pointing where Dean wanted her to go, he dropped the brake, putting her back in gear and planted his foot.

The barrier was mere millimeters from Baby’s flank as her ass swung wide for just a moment. Dean expertly nudged the wheel, counter steering, taking the tight left turn with only the sexiest wiggle of Baby’s rear as she powered away.

None of the chasing police vehicles were able to make the turn in time and the cops left standing at the roadblock watched as her tail lights disappeared into the distance. Dean grinned wickedly knowing he’d given them the slip. By the time they sorted themselves out he’d be long gone.

He turned a series of corners, slowed to a legal speed and chuckled to himself as he headed south on the Alaskan Way Viaduct. Not a road he’d ever take if he was still being followed, but damn he loved the view out over the sound.

As Dean drove past the aquarium, flashing lights at ground level caught his attention. He checked his mirrors as the curve in the viaduct straightened out and saw Victor’s Firebird driving up Alaskan Way which would take him under the viaduct, below the deck Dean was driving on. But horrified he saw the Firebird go airborne and barrel roll through 540 degrees before it disappeared from Dean’s sight. He slammed the steering wheel. It was a couple of miles before he could get off the viaduct and then the same again to go back and see what had happened.

  


.oOo.

  


Detective Jody Mills jogged down the Pike Place Hillclimb stairs. Arriving at the crash scene, she was glad she’d organized to be met by a uniform officer on Western Ave who’d taken her car. There were already dozens of vehicles parked in a too small area, surrounding the Firebird on its roof.

She pulled her fitted wool coat tighter around herself as the low clouds unable to contain all the moisture they’d been carrying let it drift to the ground in ever thickening drizzle. Spotting the officer she’d been looking for, she walked to the cruiser where he stood guarding the man sitting in the back.

He spoke first. “I got Laufeyson in the back, and they’re about to cut Henriksen out of his Firebird. His leg’s trapped; they’ve had to pull out the jaws-of-life.”

“Winchester?” she asked.

“No sign, they lost him in Lower Queen Anne.”

“Shit, well this has all been a waste of time then,” she muttered. She looked around and spotted what could be an Impala parked down near Union street. “Dobbs, give me your umbrella.”

He handed it over without question and watched the lead detective of Seattle’s Auto Theft Task Force head down the street towards Pier 57. She crossed the road after the Union St intersection and stopped to speak to a man leaning against a parked car. But the drizzle turned into a light shower and he couldn’t make out any details from this distance.

  


.oOo.

  


“I know you,” Jody called out as she approached the young man. No, not man yet, still a teenager.

“You know my back,” Dean smirked, but ducked his head as the Detective held her umbrella out to shelter them both.

“You want to come along quietly?” she asked.

“How's Victor?” Dean answered the question with a question of his own.

“His leg's all banged up. He's going to be limping around the yard down in Cedar Creek. But Laufeyson’ll be there to take care of him. With their priors, they're looking at some serious time.”

Dean looked down mournfully into the Detectives eyes. “Let them go.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Let ‘em go and I'll leave.”

“You'll leave?” she scoffed, clearly unimpressed with the teen’s offer.

“You’ve got nothing on me. Juvie on a joyride. I don’t have a record. I'll get a slap on the wrist and be out in three days, right back at it.” He eyed her up, taking her measure. “Or you let ‘em go and I give you my word. I'm gone. We both know without me your tee-times grow exponentially.”

“I don't golf.” She stared him down until he looked away, and she turned thoughtful. “I do this and I see you again, I'll come after you with everything I’ve got.”

“You have my word.”

Jody looked back towards the accident site for a moment. “Get out of here. Now.” Dean moved to the driver’s door of the Impala. “Leave the car, Dean.”

Dean blushed and ducked his head. He flipped the collar of his leather jacket up and took one last longing look at the Impala, obviously unhappy to be leaving her behind. He strode off and headed up Union street.

Jody watched until he disappeared in the thickening weather. She turned and made her way back to where they had pulled Victor Henriksen free from his wreck. Dobbs stepped to her side and she told him, “Let them go. Cite Gabriel for rolling the stop and Victor for driving to endanger.”

“What are you talking about, Mills?” Dobbs asked, confused by her order. “We're letting them go? Just like that?”

“Just like that,” Jody agreed. “Quit your bellyaching, Dobbs. Let's wrap this up.”

  


.oOo.

  


It took Dean hours to get home without a car. He climbed the stairs to his mother’s beat-up clapboard house. Tired, bone weary, all he wanted to do was gather up his family and get out of Seattle’s greater metropolitan area, before Jody Mills changed her mind and put most of his other family away for a very long time.

“Mom, I’m home,” he called out as he entered the house.

She appeared in the doorway to her bedroom dressed in her pink waitress uniform. “You just caught me sweetie. Missouri called, the new girl’s bailed on her and she needs me to come in early.”

“Call her back and tell her you can’t make it.” He pushed past his mother into her room and pulled her suitcase out of her closet, putting it on her bed.

“I’ll do no such thing. Dean, what’s gotten into you?” Mary planted her hand on top of the case preventing Dean from opening it.

“We gotta go Mom, I need you to pack. I’ll go get Sammy and get him packing his stuff.”

“Dean. Stop.” And even though he knew they didn’t have time, he obeyed _that_ tone of voice automatically. He turned back into the room and sat his mother down on the bed, explaining everything to her.

Everything. Not just what happened that morning, but Victor and Gabe and a dozen other guys he’d been stealing cars with. Not just for joy rides but selling them to chop shops for parts and… Well everything. Everything except for Cas. He rubbed his empty finger where his father’s wedding ring used to be. His mom didn’t need to know Cas was part of the _life_ as well.

He ended with the agreement he made with Detective Mills that morning and finally paused long enough for Mary to get a word in.

“Pack your bag. No, Dean, I’ve heard enough.” She sighed, looking at the watch on her wrist. “I need to call Missouri and tell her I’m going to be later than I said I would be.” She stood up and moved to the phone beside her bed. She didn’t look at him when she spoke again. “I knew you were doing some shit, but I never thought you’d be so stupid. How could you Dean?” She did turn to look at him then. “You know Sam worships the ground you walk on. Is this the life you want him to follow you into?”

It was worse than a physical blow. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“I’ll call Bobby. He and your Dad have a friend, Rufus, up in Bellingham. I’ll call in a favor and get you a job up there.” She shook her head. “If you can clean yourself up, I’ll think about bringing Sam up to see you for Thanksgiving.”

“No, you’re right, he’s already asking too many questions about what I do. I’ll go explain to him that I gotta go.” Dean turned to head towards Sam’s bedroom.

“He’s not here, Cas took him out for a ride.”

“Cas isn’t here either?”

“I’m sorry Dean.” She stood looking at the phone on her bedside table, not able to look and see the heartbreak on his face that she could hear in his voice.

Dean stood in the doorway between his mother’s bedroom and the lounge room, looking at the door into leading to the kitchen and the rest of their tiny house. “Okay, I’ll umm, I’ll go pack a bag then.” He tapped his hand on the doorframe.

“Meet me by the car and I’ll drop you off on my way into work.”

“Thanks Mom,” he rasped, trying to keep the tears from his eyes.


	3. NOW

###### Sunday night, 9th February, 2003.

A dark green Subaru Impreza station wagon drives north through Georgetown on Carson Avenue South. Three kids, barely out of their teens, ride inside. Ash at the wheel with Sam riding shotgun and Garth in the backseat, face pushed through the gap looking for street signs. 

“5910 Carson Ave South, corner of South Nebraska Street.” Garth checks the piece of paper in his hand again. “I think Cole messed up. The Porsche is meant to be here.” He points at the corner Ash is approaching.

Ash indicates and turns onto Nebraska. “He didn’t mess up,” Sam replies. “It’s in there.” He points to the building on the corner. “Pull over. I need to get a tool out of the back.”

A discreet sign proclaims it to be Exotic Rentals. Sam opens the rear of the station wagon and pulls two items out of the duffle bag in the cargo area. The first is a leather-look zippered binder. It could hold a diary and other things an office worker could need. Sam’s, when opened, reveals a number of different tools and assorted items. This he tucks under his arm without comment. The second item however causes some distress in his companions.

“You’re kidding right?” Garth asks when he sees the brick in Sam’s hand.

“Sam!” Ash warns then whisper yells, “Sam,” at his retreating back. “You better get after him.” Ash tells Garth who promptly opens his door and practically falls out of the car in his rush to follow.

He runs after Sam as Ash reaches awkwardly behind him to close Garth’s door. He moves further up the road to where he can perform a U-turn and comes back to where Sam and Garth can quickly jump back into the car if everything goes wrong. And from the sound of the wailing alarm, things are going wrong.

Meanwhile, Garth catches up to Sam as he throws the brick through the near full-length window in the office area attached to the rental company’s warehouse-cum-garage. The glass shatters into hundreds, if not thousands, of pieces of safety glass and Sam steps through into the office. He walks directly to the door separating the two spaces and grins, because the locks are all designed to keep anyone coming into the office from the warehouse, not the other way around.

Which means Sam is already in the warehouse reading off the Porsche’s license plate to Garth still in the office before the alarm’s 15 second delay runs out.

“Find me those keys,” Sam yells over the now wailing alarm as he takes his toolkit to the panel next to the garage door and gets the steel reinforced glass door retracting.

Garth holds the keys high as he comes through the office door, tossing them to Sam as they run to the Porsche. Garth takes a quick look around the room taking in the Porsches, Ferraris, Lamborghinis and Bertones. “I sure hope none of these are on the list,” he sighs as he folds himself into the low-slung vehicle.

Since they have keys, they’re able to disarm the Porsche’s security measures and Sam has it out the door and onto the road before Garth has his seatbelt in place. Ash falls in behind them and Sam looks at him in his rearview mirror.

“You know what Subaru spells in a mirror?” he asks Garth, who shakes his head. “U R A Bus!” and he plants his foot and takes off leaving Ash behind.

“Newsflash Sam! You’re driving a stolen car,” Garth squeaks.

“Isn’t it great?” Sam laughs over the climbing speedometer. They’ve left Ash far behind, or perhaps Ash has been smart and turned off, separating the two cars. Sam can see on Garth’s face he wishes he’d gotten back into the Impreza with Ash.

  


.oOo.

  


In an abandoned warehouse in the Industrial District, Cole Trenton sits with his back against the wall of a cleared office space. All it contains is a trestle table with three laptops, with Charlie sitting in front of them on a large green ball, and a crappy office chair with Victor sitting in it, his leg stretched out resting on a milk crate.

Cole catches the tennis ball before throwing it, thump-thump, catch. Throw, thump-thump, catch. The ball hits the floor first and then the wall as Cole throws and catches it, again and again. Throw, thump-thump, catch.

“For Christsake, can you stop that?” Victor growls out.

“What's your problem?” Cole grins. Throw, thump-thump, catch.

Charlie, giant headphones resting over her ears, bops away to some song, ignoring everything else in the room in a way only a fifteen year old can. Throw, thump-thump, catch.

“Where are they?” Victor snaps, easing his leg from the crate to underneath him, slowly adding weight to it. Throw, thump-thump, catch.

“They'll be here.” Throw, thump-thump, catch.

“You’re not fucking Steve McQueen and this isn’t The Great Escape.” Victor stares at Cole.

“They say, back in the day, you had anti-freeze in your veins.” Throw, thump-thump, catch. “What happened?” Throw, thump.

Victor intercepts the tennis ball. He looks at Cole for a moment then throws it through the open doorway out into the warehouse where a dozen stolen cars are parked. It bounces a couple of times then rolls to a stop next to George’s foot. Victor huffs when he catches sight of the dweeby guy, proof Victor isn’t trusted to watch over Sam and his crew by himself.

Cole grins. “Relax old man.”

  


.oOo.

  


The Porsche comes to a rolling stop at a set of lights. Sam looks across into the car already stopped beside them and blows a kiss to the cute blonde sitting in the passenger seat. Then grins and winks at the guy driving.

“Stolen car, Sam. Stolen car, stolen car, stolen car,” Garth repeats himself.

“Stolen, fast car,” Sam smirks. Without looking ahead Sam guns the engine and zooms off as the lights turn green, leaving the couple in his figurative dust.

  


.oOo.

  


Cole looks at his watch. The concern is obvious on his face, even though he’s trying to hide it. He looks up to find Victor glaring at him. “Something wrong, Cole?”

“Yeah. I'm missing Springer—” he smirks, deflecting but not able to fully hide the relief on his face as the Porsche pulls into the warehouse. He covers by flashing Victor an ‘I told-you-so’ smile.

Sam and Garth climb out of the car and Sam walks over to Charlie and points to one of her screens. It’s displaying a list of cars. He pulls her headphones off and the room is filled with the sounds of _‘Walking on Sunshine’_. "You can mark off number 13. I just brought in the Oh-two Porsche 996."

Victor and Cole head out into the warehouse to look at the car. “She'll go 0 to 60 in 4.3 seconds… Do a quarter mile in 11.2—” Victor tells them.

“I know. Trust me I know,” Garth grins. Now they’re back in their home base, he’s much more relaxed.

Cole opens an old green cooler sitting next to a wall and pulls out three bottles of beer. He hands one to Victor and tosses the second to Sam as he walks back out into the warehouse, opening the last for himself. “Thirty-seven to go.” He holds the neck of his bottle out and, Victor and Sam clink their bottles against his.

Garth, not drinking, wanders into the office space with Charlie. He’s about to sit in the chair occupied earlier by Victor, when the window bursts into white hot brilliance. Light streams in, throwing the room into stark contrasts of illumination and shadow.

“Shit, shit, shit.” Charlie starts pulling cables from the laptops in front of her, shoving the first into Garth’s hands. “Run.” She takes the remaining two and bolts through the door. Garth blinks almost blinded by the bright spots in his eyes and starts to follow her. At the last moment he dashes back to the table and grabs three car keys sitting there.

George has gotten to his feet and he’s visibly freaking out. “Now you gone and done it, Winchester,” he yells over his shoulder as he heads for the side door, running off into the night.

Sam makes sure Charlie’s got everything, then tells Cole to help Victor. With a final look he picks up his father’s old green cooler and follows Garth to the secret door leading to an old speak-easy and its maze of tunnels. He pulls the door closed and drops a beam across it into the brackets he and Ash installed when they first moved in.

Grabbing one the waiting torches, he hurries down the stairs to the sounds of the police making their way into and clearing the warehouse. He finds everyone waiting for him at the bottom, in the room where the speak-easy used to run. They’re waiting for him to show them the entrance to the tunnels.

He strides across the small room and pushes the one specific spot to swing the entire back wall away, uncovering a second even smaller room with the tunnel network opening off it. “Charlie you’re with Garth. Second left, right, right, second left, right, left, right. You’ll come up two blocks to the south through a manhole. There’s a Honda Civic parked there.”

Sam waits until they leave. “Victor, you and Cole take the fourth right, second left, second right, left, left, follow the bend to the right and that’ll bring you to a dead-end. There’s a rope-pull which will open a door into the basement of a building three blocks west of here. You’ll find another Civic there.”

“Cole, you go with Sam. I don’t want anyone else with me if my leg slows me down long enough to get caught.” Victor claps Sam on the shoulder lightly to not cause any noise and repeats the directions back to Sam instead of letting him talk.

“Come on, Sam.” Victor hears Cole plead as he starts off down the tunnel, flicking the torch this way and that so he doesn’t hit his head or trip over anything. 


	4. MONDAY

There are half a dozen or more police cars scattered around when Detective Jody Mills arrives at the warehouse. She climbs out of her warm vehicle and pulls a pair of black leather gloves out of the pocket of her three quarter length fitted black wool coat. Pulling them on, she adjusts the soft grey pashmina around her throat making sure none of the cold air can seep through.

She sighs and watches the cloud of her breath dissipate in the breeze. From where she’s standing she can see her newest partner Detective Donna Hanscum waving at her from an open doorway leading into the warehouse.

Jody walks over to her, ignoring her first overly enthusiastic hello, taking one of the Starbucks cups from the tray Donna’s holding. She takes a mouthful without checking and shoots daggers at her partner when she gets hot chocolate instead of coffee.

“Sorry, Jodes.” Donna smiles brightly as she switches paper cups. Donna wraps her mitten covered hands around the hot chocolate.

Jody swirls a mouthful of black coffee around in her mouth before swallowing it. Unsure if she’s sad the coffee isn’t hotter, or happy she can take a couple of quick swallows to rinse the taste of chocolate from her tongue. Not that Jody doesn’t like a good hot cocoa when she’s curled up with a good book. But not at a crime scene.

“What have we got here?” Jody motions for Donna to lead the way into the building.

“They ran. Something must have spooked them before the officers onsite got in position.” Donna tells her as they walk in. “All they found were the cars. Whoever it is, they’re good. No dings, no dents, all the ignitions were bypassed cleanly, except for the Porsche there which has its keys still sitting in it.”

Jody looks over the thirteen cars, all neatly parked. She has a very bad feeling about this whole setup. “I thought those were meant to be unstealable?” She points to the three Mercedes Benz S320s.

“I guess not,” Donna answers her before taking a sip of her hot chocolate.

“Alright, I want all of these,” she circles her finger in the air indicating the cars, “impounded for 30 days.”

“I don’t think the owners are going to be happy about that Jodes,” Donna says.

“I don’t care.” Jody walks around the warehouse. “There’s something going on here. I can feel it.”

  


.oOo.

  


Victor pulls up in front of Turner Motors. He gets out of his Firebird and walks in through an open roller door. “Is Dean around?”

“Maybe, what do you want him for?” An old grizzled black man straightens up from where he’s been leaning into the engine bay of a late model Toyota Corolla.

“I have some news, things he needs to know.” When it looks like the guy isn’t going to tell him, Victor adds, “About his brother.”

Rufus stares him down for another couple of moments then grunts and buries his head back under the hood. “He’s next door.”

Victor walks back out and sees a massive open-sided shed with a strange cartoon deer with weird wiggly antlers leaping over the words ‘Baby Karts’ painted across its façade. A sandwich board next to its driveway proclaims it’s a go-kart track catering to 8 to 12 year olds. All safety gear supplied and engines limited to 15mph.

Victor walks over and catches sight of Dean giving a group of young kids a pep talk. He stops and leans against the chain link fencing enclosing the oversized shed. 

“Control, vision, determination. These are the three fundamental components of the new generation race car driver. Speed is a byproduct. Remember: The car is you, you are the car. Okay? Let's drive!” Dean finishes and the kids run off and jump into pre-lined-up go-karts.

Dean makes his way from the back of the pack forward, checking harnesses are tight and helmets secure. When he reaches the start line he picks up a control. He hits the first button and the red light switches to amber. “Ready? Set. Go!” He hits the second button while dropping his arm. The light is green and the kids are racing.

Victor can tell the moment Dean sees him by how his body changes. Previously loose and relaxed, even as he lopes across the indoor track pulling karts out of barriers, Dean’s whole body stiffens and he stares at Victor until a kid spins out trying to overtake another kart on a corner.

Dean snaps his attention back to the track and pulls the kart back around to face the right direction. “Come on Aiden, I’ve told you, if you want to beat Krissy you need to work on your cornering first.” He taps the kid’s helmet telling him he’s clear and the kid takes off again.

Dean studiously ignores Victor for the rest of the race and for the next two hours after it. Kids come and kids go. Dean gets each new kid fitted into sets of padded overalls, all brightly colored, and helmets. Only one kid remains through the whole afternoon—the previously mentioned Krissy.

“And I finally convinced Dad that I’m not going through a phase. I want to race. So will you do it?” She’s talking a million miles a minute as Victor walks over to Dean at the end of the day.

“I told you Krissy, I’m not a coach,” Dean replies distractedly as he checks over each kart.

“I know, I researched it like you said. But I have a better chance at being accepted onto one of the teams if I have a letter of,” she slows as she pronounces the word, “recommendation,” like she wants to make sure she’s saying it right, “from you, telling them I can do it.”

Dean looks up over Krissy’s head, watching Victor limp towards him. “Okay Krissy, tell you what. You get your daddy to come talk to me and I’ll write you your letter.”

“He’s up north still.” Victor can hear the pout in her voice, even if he can’t see her face.

“When he gets back then. Come on kiddo, I got an old friend here and I can’t pack up ‘til you’re changed and out of here.” Dean smiles at her.

“I’m not a kid anymore. I’m nearly 12.” She tosses over her shoulder as she heads over to one of the portable buildings off to the side.

“Nearly 12 is still 11,” Dean snipes back as she enters it.

“Old friend?” Victor asks.

“Yeah, how’s the leg?” Dean deflects, going back to checking the karts.

“Only hurts when I breathe,” Victor answers him, regretting it when he sees Dean flinch.

“What are you doing here?” Dean moves from kart to kart.

Victor looks around then asks. “Is there someplace we can talk?”

Dean looks up at him. “What about?”

“About your brother and the deep shit he's in—” Victor tilts his head downward. Not enough to lose eye contact, but enough to show the shame he feels.

  


.oOo.

  


A barmaid sets a pitcher of beer and two glasses on the table. “Anything else I can get you?” she asks.

“That’ll be all darlin’.” Dean shrugs at Victor’s look but the woman’s already off checking on another patron.

“It's been a long time.” Victor isn’t sure how to start this conversation.

Dean pauses in his pouring. “Six years.” He tops the first glass off and moves it across the table to Victor.

“Six years. Shit. Time flies.” Victor picks up the glass and takes a large mouthful, still stalling for time.

“Tell me about Sam.” Dean pours the second glass, but leaves it sitting in front of him untouched.

Victor puts his glass down. “He took a job and he fumbled it. Now he's jammed-up.”

“What kind of job?” Dean turns his glass in a circle not picking it up.

Victory scratches at the back of his head “A boost. A big boost.”

“A boost? What's Sam doing on a boost?” Dean sits forward and moves his glass to the side of the table next to the pitcher.

Victor frowns, picks his beer back up and takes a sip while he studies him. “You're shitting me, right?” Clearly, Dean is not. “Sam's become quite the little crew runner since you left. He's been working a small ring for two years now. You don't talk to your Mom?”

“She neglected to mention it.”

“Maybe she doesn't know. Although I don't see how. Maybe she didn't want to upset you—”

“Don't change the subject, Victor.”

Victor takes a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh. “Sam's been living the life. Only he's a wild child and he’s fumbled this one so bad, folks are already speaking about him in the past tense.

Dean uses the time it takes to reach for his glass and take a sip from it to really look at Victor. “Who was the job for?”

“Who do you think?” Dean waits. “The Carpenter.” Dean’s face speaks volumes about what he thinks of this. “I just thought you should know. I had a feeling you didn't. But I should tell you,” he pauses clearly unhappy with what he’s about to say, “I'm working for him now—Richard Roman—so if you see him, you won't mention me coming to get you.” Dean nods his agreement. “I thought—I owe you—and it’s the right thing to do.”

Dean looks down at his watch. If he leaves now, he can be in Seattle in time for a late dinner. “Thanks for the heads up Vic. Finish your drink. I need to get going.” He stands up and puts a couple of bills on the table, more money than a pitcher of beer should cost and walks away.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean stands in front of Missouri’s 24-hour diner looking through the front window at his mother dressed in what could be the exact same pink uniform she’d been wearing when he’d left. Some shithead is yelling for more coffee, Dean can clearly hear him through the opening door as someone exits. He can’t hear his mother’s reply but Dean already knows what she would have said. “Sure hon.” He’d listened to her say the same words, to the same requests, for years as he and Sam, okay mostly Sam, did homework in the back corner booth.

Dean enters and takes a seat at the counter while his mother’s turned away from him grabbing the coffee pot. “Who's a guy gotta know to get a cheeseburger in this joint?” he asks.

She turns around and spots Dean sitting there. Her expression runs through a whole gamut of emotions, the easiest to read being the one she settles on: joy.

“Hey, Mom.”

She holds a finger up and points to the coffee pot she’s holding in her other hand. “Give me one moment,” and she hurries out from behind the counter to top up everyone’s cups before coming back over to Dean. He stands as Mary puts the pot on the counter then wraps her arms around him, squeezing tight.

She takes his head in her hands and pulls it down so she can kiss his forehead. Missouri smiles from behind the order wheel.

“How are you doing, Missouri?” Dean calls over to her.

“I’m just fine. Mary, you take your boy out back and take your break now.” Missouri points them towards the back booth she keeps reserved for special friends.

Mary looks around to make sure no one needs anything, but Tara grabs the coffeepot off the counter and shoos them along. “Are you sure? You’ve been on your knee all day,” Mary asks her.

“I’m fine, it’s a slow night and you’ve just topped everyone off. Besides, Annie’ll be in soon.” The blonde woman barely limps as she replaces the coffee pot back on the warmer.

“Okay, but if you need any help just give me a call.” Mary leads Dean toward the back and the booth he spent much of his childhood in after his father died. “Have you eaten?” she asks and when he shakes his head she calls back to Missouri, “Walk a cow to Wisconsin for me?”

As they settle in to the booth, across from each other, she takes his hands. “You look good.”

“You, too,” he answers, a silence stretches between them.

She sighs. “What are you doing back Dean?”

“How's Sam?” he asks in answer.

Mary flushes and looks down at the table. “Have you seen him?”

“Not yet.” He stops talking when Tara walks over with a couple of glasses and a bottle of water. “Victor Henriksen came to see me.”

“Victor Henriksen? How’s he doing? How's the leg?” Mary pours them both water.

He looks at her. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“I couldn't. I didn't want you to worry. I thought he’d sort himself out.” She still can’t meet his eyes. “He's in trouble, isn't he?”

“Yeah, he's in some trouble.” Dean picks up the glass and drinks half of it. A flash of distaste at the plain water crosses his face.

“Let me get us some coffee.” She stands up to quickly for him to protest.

  


.oOo.

  


Outside looking in, in nearly the same spot Dean stood at earlier, Richie is standing watching them through the glass. “Detective Mills? It's me, Richie. Richie. Yeah, that Richie. You ain't never gonna guess who just come in to visit his Ma.”

  


.oOo.

  


Mary walks back carrying two full mugs. “He's changed, Dean. He's lost the sweetness he used to have. It's gone and I don't know what to do.”

Tara interrupts again, bringing Dean his cheeseburger and an overflowing basket of fries. She places them on the table, smiling apologetically for interrupting them, then hurries away as fast as she can.

“We should set her and Victor up, between them they have a pair of working legs.” He squirts a ketchup puddle onto his plate and swipes a couple of fries through it. “You getting my checks?” he asks before the fries go into his mouth.

Mary nods. “You haven't spoken to Sam in a while, I guess.”

Dean swallows. “He doesn't return my calls or texts.”

“He was thirteen when you left, Dean. He’s not the same boy you remember. You should brace yourself.”

  


.oOo.

  


“It's my new move.” Cole’s sitting on a stool at a bar table near the pool tables. The bar’s owner, Josie Sands, is wiping down the table next to theirs and he’s talking loud enough to make sure she hears. “It's called ‘The Stranger.’ What I do is I sit on my hand for ten minutes, ‘til it falls asleep, ‘til it's good and numb, no feeling, then I jerk off.”

Josie walks away, crossing the smoke filled room back to the bar.

“What's the point, man?” Garth asks innocently.

“Cos it's like you're being done by a stranger. It rocks. It's the power move of the new millennium.” He mimes rubbing his hand all over his groin.

The side door opens and Charlie enters. “Hey jailbait, get outta here!” Josie calls out, but lets off when Sam waves an acknowledgement that Charlie’s with them.

Sam takes his shot at the pool table and Ash groans as he sinks another two balls, leaving only the black 8—along with all of Ash’s solids—on the table. “Damnit Sam, let me have a shot would you?” Sam grins at him, calls the left side pocket and sinks the black smoothly.

“Hey, Sam, what's up?” Charlie asks as she slides onto a stool at the table.

“What do you want, pipsqueak?” Cole asks, reaching out to ruffle her hair but she ducks under his hand.

“Why you gotta be like that?” she complains as she moves to a stool further away from Cole. “I'm talking to Sam.”

“Why don't you leave him alone?” Cole asks in a tone clearly meant to convey that Sam doesn’t want to talk to her.

Charlie rolls her eyes at him. “You know, I’ve known Sam longer than you.”

Whatever Cole is going to say gets swallowed as Sam and Ash come back to the table.

“Any word, Sam?” Garth fills the awkward silence made by Cole choking on his own words.

“No, they won't take my calls.” He picks up his bourbon-spiked bottle of coke and takes a long drink.

“What does that mean?” Garth asks.

“It isn't what you'd call a ‘good sign’.” Sam can see their fear. “Look, we managed to get 13 in a week. We just gotta step it up.”

“But we only got ‘til Friday,” Garth says. “That's not a lot of time and we lost the 13. So we need start over.”

Sam looks at him. “Don't sweat it, Garth. We're cool.” The front door opens behind Sam’s back, but no one’s paying any attention to it as Dean enters. He quickly scans the room. Seeing them in the rear, he walks over. “It can be done. We just gotta step it up. Think of it as a challenge.”

“The challenge is not to get our nuts cut off and shoved down our throats,” Ash grumbles as he drinks his PBR, crushing the can once it’s empty.

“Can I help you, pal?” Cole moves his weight on his stool so he’s almost standing. Sam turns to see who Cole is talking to and sees Dean there.

“Hey, Sam.” Dean ignores everyone else.

“Hey, Dean—”

"Dean? You're Dean?” Sam’s cut off by Cole.

“That's right.” Dean continues to stare at Sam.

“Dean. Holy shit. It's an honor, man.” Garth thrusts his hand right into Dean’s chest in his excitement. Dean grabs it to move it out of his way but finds the tall lanky stranger pumping his hand instead.

“Garth, let him go,” Sam says and reluctantly Garth does as he’s told. “It's good to see you, man.”

“You, too.” They hold the stare.

“What are you doing back, Dean?” Garth asks, as excited as a puppy.

“Little visit. Check on the family,” he tells him.

“It's nice to see you,” Sam repeats, smiling this time. Dean nods and while the tension between them doesn’t disappear, it drops down to a low simmer.

“Hey, Dean. Remember me? Charlie Bradbury. I live next door.” She speaks once it’s clear the two brothers aren’t going to start swinging at each other.

“Sure. Hey, Charlie. You grew up.” Dean turns back to Sam, who picks up a pool cue.

“Who's got the next game?” Sam asks as he moves back to the table and racks the balls.

“I get it,” Ash says, ignoring Sam. “Dean’s come back to save our bacon!”

“Shut-up, Ash,” Cole tells him.

“Is that true? You came back to save our bacon?” Garth turns his puppy-dog eyes on Dean.

“Course it’s true. He came to save his brother's ass.”

“That can't be it. Cos we don't need saving,” Sam snaps, ignoring the balls to storm back to the table.

“We don't?” Garth asks, his confusion obvious.

Dean ignores him and everyone else, focusing entirely on Sam. “He give you an advance?”

“Hell, yeah,” Ash trumpets. “Ten large, man.” Sam shoots him a look. Like Ash's spoken out of turn.

Dean sighs. “You give him back the money and all's well.” Everyone but Sam looks down at the table looking guilty. Sam laughs, short and bitter.

“Give him back the money? _Give_ him back the money. That’d be nice. If we still had the money.” Sam walks back to the pool table and picks the triangle up setting it to one side. “No Dean, that ship has sailed. We don’t have the money anymore.” Sam breaks. Dean looks at the others. They nod. It's true. The money's gone. “But don't worry, Dean. I got everything under control.”

“Things are all good,” Cole agrees.

“The hell they are—” Ash interjects but is in turn interrupted by Sam.

“Sure they are. I appreciate the gesture, Dean. But I have it handled.” Sam sits back down at the table his back to Dean. “It was nice to see you.”

Dean nods. Looks at all of them. Smiles and reaches out, grabbing Sam by the collar, yanking him to his feet and in close, nose to nose.

“You listen to me, little brother. You fancy yourself a tough guy, but you’re a puppy with a pound cake. You can't stop me from saving your ass if that's what I feel like doing.” And with that he shoves Sam back down into his seat, toppling the table, bottles and glasses crashing. Dean walks away from them, the crowd parting like the red sea before his wrath.

“Damn. Homeboy's on the dazzle,” Cole says, just a little bit impressed.


	5. TUESDAY

There’s a chill in the air. Dean’s breath is visible as he walks around the back of a series of low slung buildings. At this end there’s a garage with a virtual cityscape of dismantled automobile carcasses piled up high behind it. A huge fork lift scoops up a wreck and hauls it over to a crusher where the car is flattened, ready for easy shelving.

He looks into the rear of the garage as he walks passed it. Inside there’s a small swarm of mechanics stripping a car down to its component parts, leaving nothing but a carcass. Next to them is a Honda Accord with a bloody windscreen.

Dean continues down to the next building, a wood workshop. He knocks on the door, it opens. “Yeah?” the guy asks.

“Dean Winchester to see Mr. Roman.”

Dean follows the guy into the building. Through the rear storage area full of racks of seasoning wood and into an enormous woodworking shop, fully outfitted with state-of-the-art machinery, table saws and drill presses, jointers and power planes. An antique treadle lathe stands in one corner. The wall next to it holds a pegboard covered in tools. Underneath it a set of shelves are crammed full of jars, bottles and cakes, of glues, resins, stains and bleaches.

In the center of the room Richard Roman stands over a work table which has several different lengths of wood laying on it. He wears most of a three piece suit, having swapped the jacket for a leather apron, white shirt sleeves folded to his elbows. A pair of protective glasses sits on top of his head and a tape measure in one hand is pulled taut with a pencil ready to make a mark in the other.

Victor Henriksen is here as well. As noisy as it was out in the yard, in here, once the door closes, it's as silent as a tomb. Roman looks up, a lopsided sneer on his face when he sees Dean. He twitches the measuring tape and lets it retract into its case. A thrust of his chin to the door Dean just entered through sees the young guy exiting it again.

“Dean Winchester. It's been a long time.” He puts the tape and pencil down. “You remember your old friend, Victor?”

“How you doing?” Dean acknowledges Victor.

“Good to see you, Dean—” Victor’s interrupted.

“What do we owe the honor?” Roman cuts across Victor.

“It's about my brother. Sam,” Dean answers.

“Yes, Sam.” Roman caresses the wood on the table for a moment then heads across the room to a different door, exiting through it.

Dean looks at Victor, raising his hands and shoulders slightly in question. Victor jerks his head in a nod towards the door, the expression on his face clearly saying ‘follow him, stupid’.

There’s a bank of monitors on one wall of the office, showing the cars being crushed in the yard, being chopped in the garage, the wood laying on the table in the room behind them. The rest show rooms and outside views Dean doesn’t recognize.

Roman gestures at the chairs opposite the desk he’s sitting behind and Dean and Victor sit in them. Before Roman can say anything the phone on his desk rings. He picks it up, listens, and looks at one of the monitors. A young guy is pictured there, standing in the garage held between two of—Dean assumes–Roman’s employees. He hangs up.

“Excuse me one moment, Dean.” He stands and exits the room. Dean follows him on the monitors.

Roman plucks a long thin chisel from the peg wall on his way out of the woodwork room. He appears in another monitor exiting the building, tossing the chisel to spin 360 degrees before the handle lands back in his palm.

“That’s George,” Victor mutters.

A third monitor shows Roman walking into the garage, and he appears in the monitor that has George in its center.

“George?” Dean half asks as he watches the guy start sobbing at the sight of Roman walking towards him.

“You remember Joyce Bicklebee?”

“The real estate agent?” Dean confirms, quickly looking at Victor.

“Yeah, that’s her George,” Victor nods, pointing back to the monitors.

In the garage Roman marches toward George, using the chisel to point at the bloodied windshield of the Honda. “You bring this to me, in this condition? Blood and guts all over it? You make me complicit? On my property? Who taught you how to think? Worst of all, weren't there supposed to be two Hondas?”

Dean and Victor look to the phone in surprise. Roman hadn’t hung up, rather he’d put it on speaker and an open line existed. They share a worried look before turning back to the monitor where George is pleading.

“Please,” he whimpers and Roman, rapid-fire, punctures his belly, chest and legs with the chisel, old-school prison-shiv style until George is on the floor, howling.

“Stupid son of a bitch.” Roman’s voice comes through clearly until they hear the unmistakable sound of a phone’s handset dropping into its cradle at the other end. The soft beeps of a closed phone line sound through the office.

Dean watches as Roman points at the still moving body on the floor, while he orders the two men who’d been holding George to get rid of the body, Dean guesses. He looks at Victor.

“Neglected to clean up after his car-jacking.”

“Jesus,” Dean mutters.

“The business changed.” In the time it’s taken them to shares these few words, George’s body has been removed from the camera’s view. The monitor now shows one of the returning mechanics hosing the garage floor. The exterior camera shows no movement and Dean’s eyes are skimming to the side to watch Roman re-enter the workshop.

“Dean,” he calls through the open door. He’s wiping the sweat from his brow with a rag on the monitor, looking directly into the camera, and he crooks his finger. Dean helps Victor to stand and they leave the office. “Now. Where were we? Oh, yes. Sam.”

“I don't want him hurt,” Dean says.

Roman looks at him and waves a hand around the shop. “I'm proud of this work. The bird feeder.” He points to his left. “The wagon wheel planter.” Pointing to the right. “The drop-leaf movable server.” Further to the right. They’re all exquisitely-rendered woodwork.

He gestures to the yard. “Metal. Steel. It's cold. Wood is warm. Alive. Provided by nature. To see a piece of wood take on the shape you want it to? It's like watching a child grow.”

Dean glances to Victor. Victor shrugs. “I'm sure you're working your way to the point. I'll wait right here.”

“My point. Simple. I require the best, I insist on it. I only engage the best. Sam and his friends? They came to me. They wanted my work.” Roman smiles. “He’s your brother and you were the best. Now? They've brought so much goddamn heat down, I may not be able to fill this order.” He’s not smiling anymore, but he’s still showing too many teeth. “Which would be very bad for me. Which in turn, is very bad for them.”

“I could kill you,” Dean tells him. “When I first heard about this. It occurred to me, I could kill you.”

“Grow up,” Roman replies. “You don't kill people like me. People like me die in their sleep in their nineties. Do you know why?” he pauses, not long enough for Dean to answer, just enough to make his point. “Because if you did kill me? And everyone knew it was you? For the next ten years they'd be finding pieces of those you love scattered all over the Pacific North-west.”

Dean notes a pistol resting on a shelf nearby.

“No, no. You don't kill me, because you can't,” Roman continues. “You don't take your brother and run, because we'll find him. You don't go to the police, because I have friends there. You do nothing but deal with me.”

Dean eyes him. “I can come up with the front money. Pay you back.”

“If it was only that easy. I have obligations. The order needs to be filled.” Roman picks up a single sheet of paper from between the slabs of wood on the work table and hands it to Dean. “On that list, you'll find fifty cars. Fifty. Five zero. They range in age from the 1950 Mercury Custom to the 2002 Porsche 996; and in expense from the 1998 Chevrolet Corvette C5 to the 1967 Ferrari 275 GTB4 Hardtop. Fifty cars. Five zero.”

Dean scans the list and looks back to Roman.

“There is a container ship. Terminal 25. Ready to be loaded with shipping containers. Four cars per container. The ship leaves on Friday morning for South America and the men who've tendered me this contract.”

“They only gave you a week?”

“They gave me two weeks, half of which I wasted with your brother and his crew, who not only lost what pitiful few they managed to boost, but also alerted the heat as to our endeavor, making this even more difficult to achieve.”

Dean scans the list.

“Fifty cars. I'm paying two hundred thousand dollars.”

Dean looks up. “I'm not interested—”

“I knew you'd say that.” Roman’s smirk is back.

“I'm just here about my brother,” Dean tries again.

“I knew you'd say that, too—” Roman’s smirk grows into a shark smile.

Dean looks at him then at Victor, realizing the trap. “Spell it out for me.”

“Your brother has until 8am Friday morning. Fifty cars. Five zero. For that he gets two hundred large.”

“And if he doesn't make it?” Dean dreads the answer.

Roman lays a hand on the wood on the table. “I’m making this. Custom order for your obnoxiously tall brother. I already have the brass handles picked out. Expensive hardwood, lined with white satin.”

Dean waits, knowing where this is going.

“I’m making young Sam his very own casket. In case he fails. If the ship sets sail without the fifty cars, Sam’ll take up permanent residence in this box.”

Roman walks to the back wall and hits a switch there, a corrugated steel sliding door rises, revealing a loading dock facing the back of the yard. The two men who held George are working there, scuzzy dudes, mid-thirties and dressed in dirty coveralls.

“Come here for a second,” Roman calls them inside, they enter. “Edgar, Chet. Let me introduce you to Dean Winchester. He used to head up the dandiest ring on Puget Sound. Left us for parts unknown. Dean, this is Edgar and that's Chet.”

“Hi, Dean.” The wiry blond waved a hand. Dean doesn’t answer. Roman’s smile turns bloody. Nodding to Edgar and Chet, they go back to work.

“Edgar and Chet will be in charge of burial. They're good boys.”

Dean’s look is cold and furious. “I don't want them hurt. Any of ‘em.”

“I wanted the Raiders to win the Superbowl. But we don't get to choose these things,” Roman scoffs. He hits the switch again and the door rattles closed. “I really don’t care how the fifty get on the ship. I just care that they do. You decide.” Dean grunts an acknowledgement and heads out the same way he was shown in.

“I think about that night a lot,” he says when Victor catches up to him.

“Me, too. Every time I walk,” Victor smiles softly and claps Dean on the shoulder to take the sting out of his words.

“How they were just there. Waiting on us.” Dean stops beside by his ‘88 Ford F250 truck and looks back over the stacks of crushed cars.

“Yeah.” Victor stands looking over the stacks, letting the silence settle over them. Dean sighs and opens the door of his truck to get in, but pauses when Victor starts talking again. “You know, I never really thanked you. I want you to know I meant to,” Victor tells him. “Don’t look at me like that. My leg’s because of me. I lost control of my Firebird, that’s not on you.” He claps Dean on the shoulder again. “I know you walked away to save me and Gabe.” Dean shrugs. “I’ve got a contact for him if you want it?” Victor offers.

  


.oOo.

  


The sign over the ratty tin shed says Singer Auto Repair. Dean spent a lot of his youth here. Both before and after he started relocating cars.

Bobby Singer, ex-marine. He’d been John Winchester’s sergeant and had made sure he, along with Rufus Turner, William Harvelle and Deacon Kaylor survived Da Nang, where the men bonded tightly before Echo 2/1 had been redeployed to Camp Pendleton in California.

California was where John met and married Mary Campbell, Bobby acting as his best man.

After two tours, only Deacon opted to return to his hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas. Rufus, Bill and John—with Mary—followed Bobby north to Seattle.

Within a couple years Bill had met and married Ellen, and Rufus had moved even further north, finding the bustle of Seattle too busy.

He’d opened his own gas station and service shop in Bellingham, employing Dean for the past six years. Now Dean stands outside the building which had been a second home to him and steels his nerves before entering.

The large double doors are wide open allowing Dean to walk right in. Inside the shed looks vastly different than its exterior would have a passerby believe. To each side of the double doors are three car bays angling off the central driveway. All six are filled with cars.

Bobby appears out from under the hood of a 1971 AMC Javelin SST. Dean does a quick scan of the other five cars. Beside the 1962 Ferrari, SWB 250 GT Spyder and the 1961 Porsche Speedster, every car in the shop is pure American muscle.

“Was expecting you last night,” Bobby speaks gruffly as he crosses the workshop to Dean. “Do I look like a ditchable prom date to you?” he says as he pulls Dean in for a hug, slapping him on the back twice before letting him go.

“How’d you know I was in town?” Dean asks as he follows Bobby towards the back of the garage and his office.

“Rufus called. Then Mary called looking for you when she got home and you weren’t there. And Ellen called after that, to let me know you were crashing at hers.” Bobby speaks over his shoulder.

Dean catches sight of Jo working under a hoisted 1970 Mach-1 Mustang and gives her a slow wave as he enters the office. Bobby closes the door behind them. “What happened here?” Dean asks the man who’d stepped up and been a second father to him after John died when Dean was twelve.

“What’d ya mean?” Bobby asks as he pours two glasses of whisky. Dean raises his eyebrow, looking at Bobby, clearly questioning drinking before 10 but Bobby shrugs a single shoulder, holding the second glass out for Dean to take or not. Their silent conversation has no impact on their verbal one.

“The chop shop? Where are all the stripped cars? The rolled-back odometers? The parts bins?” Dean takes the glass and takes a swallow, coughs, and picks up the bottle to look at it. “What is this rot-gut?”

“What happened? Your mother happened. She called me, begging me to call Rufus, get you out of the life, stop Sam from getting into it.” Bobby knocks back his whisky and points to his glass for Dean to add another inch.

“Yeah well you did a pretty piss poor job of that,” Dean says, then holds his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, sorry. That’s not what I meant. What happened Bobby? When I left, you, Mom and Rufus all told me to leave Sam behind. You all said it was the only way to save him. But all I’m seeing is the shit everyone told me would happen if I stayed.” He pours himself a second glass and recorks the bottle.

“Hindsight’s a beautiful thing.” Bobby picks up the bottle and puts it away. “He couldn’t accept you’d gone, that you weren’t coming back. He fell in with a bad crowd for a bit. I thought I pulled him out of it when I got him working here, but it wasn’t enough.”

“You wanted him out of the life, but pulled him into working here?” The disbelief is fully evident in Dean’s voice.

“I changed when you went up to Rufus’. I couldn’t keep destroying them anymore. Now I’m a means of resurrection and restoration. There’s so few things in life we can save. Most die. But the cars that come in here, they don't have to.”

“Huh.” Dean doesn’t quite know what to say to that.

“I heard Sam’s got himself in a bind?” Bobby drains the last of his glass and stands up to take it into the combined staff room and kitchen.

Dean follows him, sipping at the contents of his glass. “He's gotten involved—”

“With Roman,” Bobby interrupts. “You got the list yet?”

Dean pulls the folded sheet out of his pocket and hands it over. “You think it can be done?”

“You considering a comeback tour?” Bobby reads down the list.

“It’s Sam. I know I promised you, promised Mom. And Rufus too. But it’s Sam.”

“It can be done. Take a day to shop and prep. I'll give you access to my bible for free.” Bobby reaches over and takes the glass from Dean’s hand and empties it down his own throat. “You also have to hope Sam's jerk-circus didn't trip Mills so much that she's setting up surveillance teams on every city block.” He rinses the second glass and sits it beside his own on the sideboard. “And you’ll need a crew.”

“The hard part,” Dean agrees. “Any of them still working here?”

“The old crew? I can't help with that. Since I've cleaned up, they no longer come around. Pity how legitimacy makes you unpopular…”

“I don't know how happy they'll be to see me.”

“I remember I had a 1971 Chevrolet Chevelle. Everything on it was broke and I fixed it. On a quiet night, you could hear it rusting in the garage,” Bobby muses. “But when that car was gone, I missed it. If it came driving back in here right now, there'd be tears and laughter.”

“And the moral of that story is?”

“Go to them. They'll be happy to see you.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean pulls his truck up in front of the small shingle and clapboard house he hasn’t lived in for six years but still thinks of as home. He heads up the driveway. With a hand on the gate he turns to look at the Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor pulling up behind his F250. He sighs and heads over to it.

Detective Jody Mills gets out of the driver’s seat. “I know you.”

“You know my back,” Dean replies across the car, noting the other Detective with her. “New partner?”

“Detective Donna Hanscum.” She holds her hand out to him, he laughs softly and shakes it.

“I like you,” he says to Hanscum then asks Mills. “Where did you find her?”

Mills doesn’t answer as she walks around the car. Hanscum draws her hand back and asks. “When'd you get to town, Winchester?”

“The other day...” Dean trails off.

“What for?” Hanscum asks.

“No particular reason,” Dean evades.

“Where you been, anyway?” Hanscum continues her questioning.

“Here and there. Roaming around. Building up my collection of fridge magnets.”

Dean and Mills lock eyes as she stops beside Hanscum. “I remember us having a deal, Dean. I don't remember this deal having some kind of time-limit. I look at you—here in my town—and I'm confused.”

“A little family emergency,” Dean tells her.

“I hope it's not your mother.” There is genuine concern in her voice.

“No.”

“Or your baby brother. What was his name?” The concern in her voice tempers from heart-felt to something more pragmatic.

“Sam,” Dean says.

Mills nods, “Sam.” Dean says nothing, waiting. “I’ve a rash of thefts. Got a new crew making noise. We recovered a big take yesterday.”

“And this has what to do with me?” Dean asks.

“I don't know. But you shouldn't be here. Take care of your business. I'll give you 24 hours. Then I don't want to see your face ever again. Make a fool of me once, that's my bad. Make a fool of me twice, that's _really_ my bad.” Mills gives him a hard look. She nudges her partner and walks around the car, getting back in it. She drives off without saying another word.

Dean rubs at the back of his neck and returns to the gate, letting himself through as he walks across the yard to the old shed he’d fixed up when he was a teen and moved into.

The door has a single D shaped handle on it—the type more at home on a kitchen cupboard than a door—and a deadbolt. Dean pulls his keys out and is happy to find the key he has still works. He pushes his way into the room and discovers that while the layout hasn’t changed, the bed in the corner has and it’s full of his oversized little brother fast asleep.

Dean also notes his old posters, which Sam used to give him shit about, are all still on the walls. Classic cars and classic rock bands every one of them. He looks up to the pitched ceiling and even the bright yellow rectangle with its prancing horse is still there.

Dean smiles thinking about the day he and Cas had put it up there and about what they’d done on their bed afterward. Dean’s rather happy Sam is not sleeping on that bed.

“What are you doing here Dean?” Sam’s voice snaps his attention down away from the poster. Dean hurries to close the open door he’d still been standing in the middle of. The invading cold air must’ve woken Sam, given he’s pulling the blankets more tightly around himself. “This isn’t your room anymore. You left.”

“Yeah. Yeah I guess this is your space now.” Dean plays with the keyring in his hands and then places the key to the door down on the chest of drawers with a click. Holding it in place with a single finger Dean looks at the books sitting there.

Every single one he’d left behind is still there. He does another look around the room. Under a layer of Sam’s possessions, all of his are still there. Right where he’d left them that morning. Only the bee painting Cas’d hung above the drawers is missing. Dean remembers trying to fit it in his bag that day but it’d been too large, too square to fit in a duffle. The last place he’d seen it was on his unmade bed.

“It’s in a box in the closet.” Dean can hear Sam moving behind him, pulling jeans on from the sound of it.

“What is?” Dean pulls his eyes from the empty nail to watch Sam take two steps and pull the wardrobe open. Leaning down Sam pulls out a cardboard box from the bottom, which he hands to Dean then places the unframed bee canvas on top of it. Dean immediately moves it to the side, pawing through the contents of the box. “This is all Cas’ stuff. Didn’t he…” Dean stops, not sure how to finish the question, or if he even wants to know the answer.

“He’d taken me out for lunch that day, he was still sitting in the house with me waiting for you to come home when Mom got home and told us you’d left. I asked when you’d be back and Mom said you weren’t coming back. Cas stood up and walked out the front door. He’s never been back here.” There is a cold fury in Sam’s voice and Dean isn’t sure if it’s Sam’s or Sam feeling it on behalf of Cas. “I asked him for a long time if he wanted his stuff. Told him I’d pack it up and bring it to him. But every time he told me he’d come and get it when he was ready.” Sam picks the bee picture up and puts it back on top of the box.

Dean swallows, nods and leaves, taking the box with him. Leaving it in the back bedroom he’d shared with Sam until he’d moved out to the shed.

  


.oOo.

  


There’s a sign on the roof of the Ford Fiesta which reads ‘Chad Little’s Defensive Driving School’. It’s not enough warning for other drivers sharing the road with it.

It bunny-hops forward in small jerky motions as if the driver has problems committing to accelerating. Eventually he commits and the car zooms forward at ten miles per hour over the speed limit, nearly getting side-swiped by a properly indicating and merging pick-up truck as the Fiesta zooms out of its blind-spot and right into the space it was changing lanes into. A howl of terror erupts from the small white vehicle.

“Pull over! Pull her the hell over!” Gabriel demands.

The almost sixteen year old Asian American boy, his hands glued to the car’s steering wheel at the correct ten and two positions pulls the car over in a lopsided lurch. All the while begging the instructor’s forgiveness. “I’m so sorry Mr. Laufeyson, I really thought I had it that time.”

“Put it in park. Remember how to do that? It's the letter P." Gabriel points at the gearstick.

He parks it. “I'm sorry. I studied really hard, I promise, I don’t know why I’m so bad at this.”

“Driving isn’t just book learning Kevin. You have to be looking at five things all at once and second guess what the other drivers are doing.” Gabe leans over and pats him awkwardly on the shoulder. “Now I want you to hop out and we’re going to swap sides and I’m going to show you how to do it again.”

Kevin opens his door without looking and it’s torn out of his grip by a passing car. Gabriel, hand still on Kevin’s shoulder, pulls him back away from the gaping hole in the car.

“Jesus kid. You can't—” He takes a quick breath. “You can't drive. Time to acknowledge it and move on.” Gabe leans over him, patting him down. “I can't swim. I know I can't. So you know what I do? I stay the fuck out of the water.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s waiting outside the driving school when Gabriel and Kevin climb out of a taxi. Gabe sees him immediately but pays the driver first. Motioning for Dean to wait for him, he walks a very dejected Kevin inside.

Dean leans back against the corner of the building and waits. Within five minutes Gabriel has stepped back outside and is walking towards him. “Damn! Dean Winchester. Long time.” He opens his arms out as he comes to a stop.

Dean grabs Gabe’s right hand in his own and slaps Gabe’s shoulder with his left. “How are you, man?”

“I’m probably about to be fired,” Gabe smirks and shrugs. Then leans in and wraps his left arm around Dean, hugging him. “What are you doing here?”

Dean steps back and gestures for them to take a walk. “Sam’s in trouble.”

“I heard about that. What do you need?”

“You know where the others are?”

Gabriel frowns, looking closely at Dean. “Most of ‘em are gone. The Banes twins are moving weight in Florida. Kubrick and Creedy are doing a nickel in Cedar Creek and Gordon Walker was killed in Portland.” Gabriel stops next to his Z28.

“You still driving her?” Dean lays a hand on the orange ‘69 Camaro.

“Of course I am!” Gabriel sounds indignant before leaning down to whisper to his car. “Don’t you listen to him Kali.”

“I meant she looks good,” Dean holds his hands up in protest.

“Course she does, Bobby’s the only one I trust to touch her,” Gabe grins. “Okay, so who’s left. Victor's gimp and running errands for Roman. Benny’s still around, I guess. Of course, there's—” His pause is meaningful.

Dean shakes his head. “Forget that.”

“Okay. Figure it forgotten.” It’s Gabe’s turn to hold his hands up. “So you’re doing it? Pulling baby brother out of the fire?” Dean looks at Gabe like that’s not even a question.

  


.oOo.

  


Sam is leaving Abaddon’s bar. It isn’t that late in the evening but he’s had enough. “You going home?” Charlie asks, following him out.

“Yeah. You wanna ride?”

“Sure,” Charlie replies.

“How'd you get here anyway? Your mom give you a ride?” Sam grins at the younger girl.

“Hell, no. I boosted a ‘Vette,” she brags.

“You boosted a ‘Vette?” Sam smiles at her then asks, “So where is it?”

“I don’t know, it was right here.” She points to an empty space. “Someone must've boosted it back.”

“Damn crooks everywhere.” He plays along and they smile at each other walking towards Sam’s Nissan 300ZX.

When they reach it, Edgar and Chet step out of the shadows and push them up against the nearby wall.

“What do you want?” Sam asks.

Chet punches Charlie in the stomach and she doubles over. Sam strains to protect her, but Edgar has him pinned face first to the wall, arms behind his back.

“You don't need to do that. Leave her alone!” Sam begs. “She's got nothing to do with this—”

“Shut up, Winchester,” Edgar hisses and clips him on the back of the head with a blackjack. Sam falls gracelessly to the ground.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean slips into the building, checking the bar area. There’s a bunch of people he doesn’t know sitting at the bar and Pamela’s standing behind it serving. She catches sight of him and smiles, then nods her head to the side indicating what he wants is over to the side where the tables and booths are located. Dean looks over and sees Cas right away.

He’s wearing the honey colored t-shirt Dean saved up and bought for him for his fifteenth birthday. Dean had mown his neighbor’s lawns all summer, along with any other odd jobs they’d let him do.

After he’d gotten the t-shirt he’d painstakingly used a ruler and protractor to draw a honeycomb pattern on it in permanent marker. Then he’d hand sewn on the small embroidered bees he’d found at a school fete just before spring break. It’d taken months to save for and make, but the look on Cas’ face when he’d opened the newspaper package had been worth every stabbed finger Dean had suffered.

Of course the bees fell off the first time Cas wore it and the permanent marker started fading with the very first wash. But they’d saved three bees and Cas had found actual fabric paint and traced over parts of Dean’s work, a little bit here and there, thickening some lines, ignoring others entirely. At first Dean thought the pattern Cas made was abstract until more of the marker faded and the highlighted cells became their initials.

At some point in the past few years Cas had added more paint obscuring the D and C.

Dean’s surprised the t-shirt still fits him, but maybe it doesn’t. The neck has been torn out exposing both of Cas’ collarbones plus the entire bottom half of the shirt is missing and it clings to Cas almost as tightly as the tiny ripped denim shorts he wears. Those looked painted on over the inch square fishnets encasing his ass, thighs and disappearing into the biker boots he’s wearing.

Currently he’s slapping at the hands of some drunk trying to paw at him. Dean nearly rushes forward to help, but Cas has the guy well in hand and starts walking him towards the door. Dean slips into a booth before Cas can catch sight of him. Not quite ready to speak just yet.

“I think you've had enough, Marv,” he says as they pass by Dean.

“Enough? I haven't even started. Gimme another—”

“If you leave now, Marv, you can get a head-start on waking up in a pool of your own vomit,” Cas says as they approach the door.

“Listen, you little punk—” The rest is lost as Cas throws him out of the door.

Cries of "Atta boy, Cas!" pepper the air.

“Come back when you've learned how to drink, Marv.” Cas slams the door closed.

He heads back to where he’d been before throwing the drunk out but freezes when he sees Dean. He stares, the shock on his face clear. Spinning on his heel he changes directions and heads behind the bar. Dean stands up and follows him, taking a stool.

“What are you doing here?” Cas asks as he pours a beer for the next patron down.

“Buy you a drink?” Whatever Dean had planned to say has disappeared and he feels like he’s grasping at straws.

“Nope. I got a coffee. And a… friend.” Cas waves to a guy standing at the end of the bar. He looks older, definitely late 20s, maybe even early 30s. He’s short, well he’s shorter than Dean anyway. Possibly even shorter than Cas. He waves back. Dean frowns. “Mick Davies.”

“Mick Davies.” Dean tastes the name on his tongue.

“That’s what I said,” Cas says.

“So I was replaced by Mick Davies?” Dean takes another look at the guy. He’s green-eyed, brunet and has perfectly groomed stubble.

“No. You were replaced by Inias. Who was replaced by Phillippe. Who was replaced by Meg, and then Hannah. Then Meg and Hannah together.” Cas’ lip quirks in a tight smile. “Who were replaced by Mick. Not that it’s any of your business.” His smile turns sour as he looks at Dean.

“Wow, and to think all I accomplished these past six years was reading The Lord of the Rings trilogy,” Dean says mockingly. Cas stares at him, shakes his head and busies himself with glassware. “You look great.”

“You should leave,” Cas tells him.

“On account of Mick?”

“On account of me.”

Dean studies him. “I took the brunt for a lot of people, Cas. Including you. Can't we improvise a little here?”

“No. You left me, remember?” Cas pulls another beer and delivers it to another patron before coming back.

“I left town. I didn't leave you.”

“You left.”

“I’m here now.”

“Too late.”

Dean rubs his hands over his face. When he looks up again there’s a shot glass sitting in front of him which Cas is filling with whisky. “Sam's in trouble.”

Cas’ face switches from the cold mask he’s been wearing to instant concern. “What kind of trouble?”

“He took a job. Fifty ladies in two weeks. Only the two weeks are more than half done and not a single lady has been dated.”

“And he needs some Italians?” 

“Six, plus friends,” Dean agrees.

Cas picks up the shot glass and downs the contents. “I don’t do that anymore. Haven't for a while. I've carved out something for myself. It's not much, but it's mine.”

“I understand—” A hand reaches over his shoulder and places a heavy-bottomed, old-fashioned glass on the bar between him and Cas.

“Another, Cas.” His voice is deep and very British.

“Sure, Mick.” Cas picks up the glass and walks away, dropping it into a bar tray with other dirty glasses, before picking up a fresh glass and the single cocktail shaker.

“I feel like I should introduce myself.” Mick sits on the empty stool beside him. Dean shrugs a shoulder and they watch Cas make his drink. When he reaches to pluck a bottle from the top shelf Cas’ t-shirt rides up and Dean catches a flash of silver. Hearing Dean suck his breath in sharply, Mick turns back and studies Dean. “Mick Davies,” he says, holding his hand out.

Dean turns to him. “Dean Winchester.” He takes Micks hand after a moment and is surprised to find the other man’s grip firm without being crushing. He’s not trying to overpower Dean in a show of dominance.

“Dean?” Mick looks over at Cas quickly. “Well now, that’s interesting.”

“Is it?” Dean asks.

“What’re you two talking about?” Cas puts Mick’s new glass on the bar.

“Nothing, nothing at all,” Mick tells him. “We just got done saying hello.”

Dean looks at the smile Mick’s giving Cas, and decides he doesn’t want to hang around any longer. “If you change your mind, you know how to find me. Its 50 ladies by Friday morning. For The Carpenter,” Dean tells Cas and walks out of the bar.

Mick watches him leave. “So that’s Dean Winchester?”

Cas looks at the door and shrugs.

Mick exaggerates looking at his watch. “Well, I have a flight to catch.”

“You do?” Cas looks at him in surprise.

“Yeah that trip I told you about? It got moved up.” Mick pulls his wallet out and pulls a bunch of bills out, putting them on the bar. “I’ll be gone for at least a month. Maybe…” Mick deliberately looks at the door again, making sure Dean has fully disappeared before he continues. “Maybe we part as friends. See where we both are when I get back.”

“Mick—”

“It’s alright Castiel, you need to do what you need to do, and you need to be free to do it.” Mick grabs the hand Cas is stretching out to him and places it to his lips in a soft kiss. He doesn’t say anything else before he turns and leaves, leaving a full untouched whisky sour behind him. Cas looks at the door close, then down at the drink. He pulls the cherry and orange slice from the glass and drains it.

Outside Mick waits until the door is fully closed behind him and he calls out. “Dean!” Looking around hoping he’s not too late to catch the guy.

Dean, head resting in his crossed arms leaning against the hood of his truck, looks up. “Yeah?”

“Good, you’re still here,” Mick says as he walks over. “I wanted to tell you how happy I am I got to meet you before I leave.”

“Leave?” Dean repeats.

“Yeah, I’m headed back to London tonight, I was only here saying goodbye to Castiel.” He sticks his hand out again, waits until Dean takes it, and pulls him in close. “It’s never too late to fix your mistakes.”

A taxi pulls up next to the bar and Mick lets Dean go. “That’s my ride.” He walks over to the car and gets in without another word. Dean watches as the taxi pulls away, looking contemplatively between its disappearing lights and the door leading to Cas.

  


.oOo.

  


Sam wakes up in his car. Hot white light pours in through the side window, blinding him when he tries looking that way. The other three sides of the car are boxed in by metal walls. A shadow falls over him as Roman steps between the floodlight and Sam.

“Hello, Sam,” Roman greets him politely.

Sam tries to open the car door to get out but the door only opens an inch or so. Sam looks over his shoulder to see what it’s hitting and sees the forklift. That’s when he realizes he and his car are currently in a car crusher.

“Let me out—” he starts speaking as he repeatedly tries opening his door, even knowing it’s barred from the outside.

“Were it only that easy,” Roman interrupts him.

“I can still do it,” Sam tells him, banging the door again and again against the forklift.

Roman raises a hand, two fingers pointing up and jerks them to point to the side. Someone outside of Sam’s view hits a button and the press of the crusher lowers against the roof. Roman twists his hand into a cutting motion and the crusher halts with the roof only just starting to cave in. Sam slips down in his seat. He doesn’t have much headroom to start with being as tall as he is.

“No you can't. You’re an ant at a picnic. Just because you’re hungry, doesn't mean you belong.”

Sam pushes at the door again, but the angle of the roof now means he can’t even close the door to get any additional force behind it. While he’s busy with the car door, Roman makes the same start up motion and the roof buckles in further.

Sam scrabbles to get as low as he can across the two front seats “Listen, Roman—”

He’s interrupted again. “Call me ‘Dick.’ Better yet, call me ‘Asshole.’ Since that's how you've treated me.” The machinery stops again. The roof is sitting nearly flat to the car’s body.

“Let me out, I can still get this done, we can still get this done.” Sam peers through the narrow opening the side window’s become and sees Roman make a universal ‘wrap-it-up’ movement with his hand and walk away. “Roman!” he screams but the noise from the crusher drowns him out. He waits for the car to collapse in on him but nothing happens.

There’s another awful noise. Sam strains to see what it is, only he can't get a good angle to the remaining gap. Something clatters on the roof of his car and spike claws pierce the Nissan, barely missing his back. He can’t breathe for fear of what’s going to happen next.

The car rises up into the air and swings around. Sam can feel the panic welling up in him and he vomits, most of it going between the seat and the door. But enough of it is on the seat that he finds his head laying in a wet patch as the car is lowered and the claws retract.

For a time nothing seems to happen then there are a series of odd rattling noises before an engine starts and Sam start moving. The car must be on the back of a truck.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s sitting at the kitchen table. To his left is the list of cars, to his right is the box Sam gave him earlier. He knows he should be making notes on the cars, but the box is calling to him.

He gets up and heads into the living room. He stands in the middle of it and looks around, not entirely sure why he got up, or what he’s doing in here. As he starts to head back to the kitchen and the table, he hears an enormous metal scraping thud out the front of the house.

Dean rushes to the window to see what’s happening. He sees a ramp truck unloading a nearly flattened car. It’s still mostly rolling on its own wheels but the roof has been crushed down into the cabin and the single door Dean can see is bulging outwards. He runs to the back bedroom to pull his boots on and dashes out the back door, around the house, in time to see the tow truck driving off.

Dean runs to the mangled 300ZX. Slides, coming to a stop when his body hits the side of the car. A pained moan sounds from the inside, along with a foul reek. “Sammy?”

“Yeah,” he groans from the other side of the vehicle.

Dean leans down trying to see into the space. “You all right?” He thinks he can see his brother’s legs but they seem to be half on the passenger’s seat, half in the foot well.

“I think so. I can't feel my feet right now.” Sam sounds pained.

“I can see them, they’re both there.” Dean reassures his brother as he tugs at the door before straightening up and hurrying around to the driver’s side.

“Hey Dean, you think you can get me out of this?” Sam asks as their eyes meet in the sliver of space remaining of the door’s window. “I'd really appreciate it.”

Dean grabs hold of the door and pulls on it with all his might. It starts to move then catches on something Dean can’t see and refuses to open any further. “Just hold-on there—” He’s already running back to the detached garage.

Dean finds a crowbar, an acetylene torch he hopes he won’t need and a pair of tin-snips. He takes the crowbar and tin-snips back out to the wrecked car. He tries the passenger side first but soon gives up and goes back around to where Sam can see him.

He wedges the crowbar into the gap and, just before putting his strength behind it, speaks. “So you want to run that part by me again about things being ‘all handled’.”

“This has nothing to do with any of that,” Sam tells him, trying to wiggle back away from the door.

“You have more than one enemy who owns a car-crusher?” Dean grunts as he pushes against the bar, then sighs when the door pops out further.

“All my enemies own car crushers. It's like a prerequisite,” Sam snarks right back at him then lets out a moan of pain as the opening door lets the crushed roof sink further and the torn metal comes into contact with his skin.

“Easy. Take it easy. We're almost there.” Dean pops up onto the hood of the car and gets his fingers into the gap feeling for anything he can do. “Sam can you twist to the back at all?”

Dean can hear Sam trying to move and the snarl of pain he bites down on. “I’m away from the edge, but I’m not going to be able to get out on this angle.”

“Give me a minute.” Dean pulls the tin-snips from his back pocket, wiggles them into the tear and rolls the metal up and around the blades like an old fashion spam tin. The other edge is already curved towards the direction Sam will need to go and Dean hopes it’s enough. “Okay, let me get back and help you.” He slides off the hood and crouches in front of Sam. Right in the expanding pool of vomit.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” Sam grimaces as he rolls side to side slightly.

“Don’t care, let’s get you out of there.” Dean reaches into the space and, getting his hands under Sam’s arms, slowly pulls him out of his car burrito, falling on his ass as he pulls Sam further and further out of the car.

Finally they’re lying on the road together looking back into the crevice Sam had been wedged in. He holds up his left socked foot and complains, “I lost my shoe.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s standing in the kitchen using a washcloth to wipe down his legs where the vomit soaked through his jeans. Sam, with carrot chunks in his long hair, called dibs on the shower so Dean’s making the best he can while he waits.

Sam enters through the backdoor, coming in from the enclosed verandah containing their bathroom and laundry. “If you throw your clothes in the machine I’ll start the load,” he says as he pulls a ratty bathrobe around him. 

“You okay?” Dean asks not for the first time since he got Sam out.

“I'm fine.” Sam moves to the fridge not quite limping. He sees the look on Dean’s face and continues. “It was a tight space and I was bent like a pretzel in it. I’ll be fine once I can stretch out. You want a beer?”

“Sure—” He wants to say more but Sam places a bottle in his hand and walks into the living room. Dean follows him. He winces as he watches Sam sit on the floor with his legs spread out wide, it’s not the splits but Sam’s not far off them either. “You better not Sharon Stone me.”

“I’m wearing underwear, Jerk.” Sam sends him the same ‘I’m so done with you’ look he perfected at age eleven.

“Bitch,” Dean replies without thinking about it and they grin at each other.

“So Mom said you went up north?” Sam relaxes into his stretch.

“Yeah,” Dean says wincing again as Sam lowers his chest almost to the floor and holds there.

“I heard you were pumping gas.” It’s not quite a question.

“Something like that.” Dean’s happy to see Sam getting up off the floor. He moves more easily to the couch and sits in it, pointing at the other end until Dean joins him.

“I’m trying here, Dean. Help me out.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dean huffs and chugs the second half of the bottle. “You want another?” Sam holds his still full bottle up. “Yeah, okay, I’ll be right back.” He takes extra time to grab the clothes he was wearing and, adding them to Sam’s, he starts the washer. He grabs a fresh bottle from the kitchen on the way back and finds Sam on the phone when he gets back.

“It’s out the front of my place. And Cole,” he pauses for effect, “Mom gets off at three tonight and she really doesn’t need to see it, okay?” Sam sees Dean in the doorway and motions for him to sit. “Thanks man. And you’re sure Charlie’s okay? You saw her yourself?” Another pause this time as Cole replies. “She’s like family, dude, of course I worry.” He pauses again. “Yeah thanks. I’ll call you tomorrow.” And Sam hangs up. “Cole’s going to get my car moved before Mom gets home.”

“Smart,” Dean nods. “So what’re you going to do?”

“About what?”

“About what?” Dean repeats.

“About Roman? I'll call him. He's a reasonable guy.” Sam drinks from his rapidly emptying bottle.

“I can see that—” Dean blatantly looks out the window to the crushed car. Sam catches the look, glances himself and shrugs, ignoring the wreck. “I went and saw Cas tonight.”

“How’d that go?” Sam sets his bottle down on the coffee table and turns to look at Dean.”

Dean makes some non-committal noise that can’t work out if it’s scoffing or anguished.

“That good huh?”

“I met Mick.”

“Yeah, he takes some getting used to,” Sam smirks.

“What happened?”

“You left.” Sam reaches over and picks his beer back up, draining the bottle.

“I left to keep you out of this life.”

“You. Left.” Sam stands up and goes to walk past Dean to the kitchen.

Dean grabs his arm stopping him. “I left because Mom said if I didn’t you’d end up exactly where you are now.”

Sam pulls his arm out of Dean’s grasp. “You think you can help me?” He continues walking into the kitchen. Dean gets up and follows him. Sam opens the fridge and pulls out another pair of beer bottles. “What can you do? You haven't done anything for six years but pump gas.” He hands one of the bottles to Dean and pops the lid of the other. “And the cars, they've changed. There's new shit. Computer chip keys and sophisticated alarms, I don't think _you_ can bypass them.”

“You don't think so, huh?” Dean turns the unopened bottle in his hands.

“Not really. But you know. Maybe I'm wrong.” Sam opens the back door. “You shouldn’t have left me.” He walks through the enclosed verandah to the outside door. “You shouldn’t have left either of us, Dean.” The door closes behind him. 

Dean rubs at his face with one hand while he pulls his phone out with the other. He hits a couple of buttons and waits. “Tell him it's on,” Dean says before Victor can even say hello.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Tell him to lay off Sam and his crew, I’ll get it done.” Dean cancels the call.


	6. WEDNESDAY

Dean and Gabriel are sitting around a table they’ve pulled into Bobby’s office. The list sits between them as they split it into several categories, prioritizing how big of a problem each car is going to cause.

Gabe has two pages sitting in front of him, his pen moves back and forth between them as he works his way through the main list. The top of his first sheet states **Late Model** and he’s listing anything less than five years old on it. The other, he writes cars older than twenty-five years but leaves anything produced before 1958 for Dean’s antique list.

“Dean, Baby’s on here,” Gabe comments.

“I know,” Dean replies. It’s not abrupt, but Gabe can tell he doesn’t want to talk about it yet. They go quiet while they complete breaking up the list.

“About two-fifths are late-model, slightly less are classics, but those seven antiques are a worry,” Gabe points to Dean’s list.

“So are the fifteen exotics.” Dean pushes his second list over to Gabe and takes Gabe’s two, happy to see that between the classic and antique lists, only two cars also appear on the exotic list. A 1967 275 GTB4 Hardtop Ferrari and a 1973 911 Carrera RS Porsche. The six exotics on the late model list actually work in their favor.

“We're going to need to start beating the bushes, find out where all these beauties live.”

Bobby enters the office. “Where’s the rest of your crew?”

Dean sighs. “If we put out the word that we're crewing-up, for a one-time-only job, what do you think that'll yield?” He asks Gabe.

“Honestly? A bunch of strung-out-types and stick-up men. It ain't like the old days, Dean. The profession’s lost its…” Gabe trails off not sure what word he’s looking for.

“Dignity,” Bobby finishes for him.

“Yeah,” Gabe nods slowly.

“Well, the three of us don't exactly inspire confidence.” Dean rubs at his face and misses Bobby pulling the door open.

“Wow Sam. Lookit you, all grown up.” Dean looks up when he hears Gabe greet his brother and watches as Sam, Cole, Ash, Garth and Charlie file into the room.

“Hey, Gabe—” Sam starts to say but is cut off by Dean.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Sam looks between his brother and uncle. “Bobby called—”

Dean holds up his hand to Sam, cutting him off, and turns to Bobby.

“You need him,” Bobby shrugs.

“No we don't—” Dean tries to say, but it’s now his turn to be interrupted.

“Idjit. How are two washed-up thieves and an old man supposed to boost 50 cars in two days?” Bobby points at Dean, Gabe and himself.

“No. His criminal career’s officially come to a close.” Dean refuses to even look at Sam and his crew as he argues with Bobby.

“The purpose of this shit-show is to rescue Sam from imminent death and yes, a life of crime,” Bobby says. “However, we can’t do that without Sam and his crew here, shabby though they may be.”

Cole grunts out a startled “Hey!” but Sam puts a hand in the center of his chest stopping him from moving forward.

Dean locks eyes with Sam, knowing he has little choice. “We do this. And you're finished. Done. You go clean.”

It takes Sam a long moment staring back to answer. “Yeah Dean, I hear you.” He drops his head in acknowledgement. “Get me out of this and I'll move to the country. Open a fruit stand.”

Dean looks at him. Not sure if he trusts Sam’s easy acquisition.

“You guys have any skills at all?” Gabe asks, cutting through the building tension.

Sam’s head pops back up. “Hell, yeah.” He starts talking about his guys with enthusiasm. “Ash here is our electronics expert. He's got some gadgets you old farts maybe never heard of.” Sam slaps the skinny blond dude sporting a mullet. He then points to Cole. “Cole can drive anything with wheels and some things without.” Cole preens under his praise. Sam steps over to the short, redhead and pulls her into a one armed hug. “Charlie's a hacker, she can do things with a computer that’ll amaze you.”

“How old are you now, Charlie?” Dean asks.

“Sixteen,” she says and then, when Sam shakes her shoulder slightly, she adds, “in seven months.” Dean shakes his head.

“What about him?” Gabe points at Garth.

“Garth can order pizzas like nobody's business,” Sam tells them.

Garth starts to protest, thinks better of it and says, “People gotta eat.”

Dean sighs heavily looking over them. “Okay then, Bobby?”

“If we want to do this, we're going to have to go old-school. One night boost. Put all our nuts in one basket.”

“One night?” Cole snorts. “Are you crazy?”

“You got a better plan?” Dean’s voice makes it clear he doesn’t think Cole does.

Cole looks to Sam. “You spread it out. You move around. Shadow games and shit.”

"Shadow games?" Dean asks incredulously.

“Shadow games,” Cole agrees.

“How many cars did you have before you lost them?” Dean asks, but doesn’t wait for any of them to answer. “It’s Wednesday morning, we have less than 47 hours to deliver all the cars to Roman. If we spread it out, by tomorrow night, the heat will be on us. Mills already knows something's up. With a one-night boost, by the time the first cars are being reported stolen, the ship's set sail.”

Sam nods, it makes sense. Once he does, Cole falls into line as well.

“Go on,” Dean gestures for Bobby to continue.

“We're on a truncated time-table. We’ll take today and tonight to shop and prep, tomorrow we sleep.” He holds up his hands. “Tomorrow night we have fifty ladies to take out on dates, we don’t want to be doing that tired.” He turns to Dean. “We're still going to need to expand the crew. We've got several Italian’s on that list.” Bobby includes the rest as he continues speaking. “They’re always tricky, time consuming. We need a specialist.”

Dean looks at him, shaking his head fractionally.

“You know of one?” Ash asks Bobby.

“Yeah. He knows of one,” Dean replies and Sam can hear the fear in his voice, but he’s pretty sure no one else can.

  


.oOo.

  


Foghat's _‘Slow Ride’_ is playing on the radio in Bobby’s workshop. He’s sent most of his employees home for the day, only keeping his first-year apprentice, Jo, the daughter of one of his old marines. She’s as much family as Sam and Dean are and he knows he can trust her.

She’s in bay one with one of the cars Bobby hasn’t been able to reschedule. It’s a 1996 Ford Aspire, one owner, brought to Bobby’s for every service since it was three years old. Bobby stops in every now and then to make sure Jo has everything in hand.

In two of the other bays Bobby has a late model Mazda Protégé and a ‘75 Cadillac Fleetwood, ready for the crew to practice rusty skills on and maybe learn new ones.

Ash is showing off one of his gadgets, a beeper-sized device, to Bobby. They’re standing next to the locked Protégé. “You just stick it in the lock. Hit this little button. And—” Ash narrates his actions and presses the button. The door unlocks, the alarm gives a weak chirp and dies.

Bobby looks over at Gabriel sitting in the Fleetwood with Garth. “We're dinosaurs, Gabe.” Bobby holds his hand out. “Can I try?” he asks Ash.

“Knock yourself out.” Ash pulls the device from the door and grabs the Protégé’s keys from his pocket, resetting the alarm and lock.

On the other side of the space Sam and Dean are with Charlie, who has her laptop out.

“I hacked into an insurance company and now I’m logging into the Seattle Auto Theft Task Force site from there, so they think I'm the insurance company looking for stats on auto-theft. Only now I’m in their system, I can go anywhere I want,” Charlie explains as she taps on her keyboard.

“So what's in there?” Dean asks.

“I can tell you who's gonna be on duty. How much gas they're using monthly. I can tell you how they spend that annoying hour between Scrubs and ER,” she brags.

Dean nods, impressed.

“Good work, Charlie,” Sam tells her.

Garth's attempting to start the Fleetwood, and fails. “I’m just not getting it,” he whines.

“You'll get the hang of it, kid. You just need to remember one thing…” Gabe grins at him.

“What's that?” Garth pulls his hands out from underneath the steering wheel.

Gabe smiles. “On boost night? Bring along a good mix tape.” Garth frowns and Gabe explains. “You bring a woman back to your place for some loving, the song you put on depends on the woman, the type of lovemaking you intend to do, right?”

“I guess.” It’s obvious Garth has no idea what Gabriel means.

“You got a school teacher or Nancy from accounting, you don't put on The Bloodhound Gang. You put on Fleetwood Mac. But when you got some wild thing in your bed you put on Prince. And if you really want to get it on: You play Tom Jones.

“Okay.” Garth nods along.

“It's the same way with cars. Different cars. Different tunes. You better steal that ‘57 Chrysler listening to _‘Love Shack’_ for example. But never, never _ever_ take no Allman Brothers into a Lincoln Town Car. Could lead to disaster. Got it?”

“Got it.” Garth absolutely hasn't got it.

“Good.” Gabe grins and climbs out of the car. A rumble from the open doorway catches his attention and he turns to watch a motorbike coast into the workshop.

It pulls up right in the center and the rider turns the bike off, kicking the stand down dismounts and as the helmet comes off, Gabe steps forward.

“Whoa, Dean went out and got some big game. Hey, Cas. I was just telling the lads about mix tapes—”

Cas puts his helmet on his bike and interrupts with, “Led Zeppelin, Metallica and AC/DC.”

Gabriel grunts something about dating Dean for too long, but no one catches what he says.

Cas walks over to Bobby and is hugged and slapped on the back. “Cas,” he rumbles. “I've missed you. Don’t be so much of a stranger anymore.”

“It’s good to see you, Bobby,” Cas replies before letting go and looking over at the two brothers. “Sam.” It’s an acknowledgement, a hello, a request for how he’s doing all in the one word.

“How you doing, Cas?” Sam also pulls him into a hug. It lasts longer than two friends merely seeing each other after a long time. This is an embrace between beloved family members.

Cas laughs warmly and pulls away. Neither answers the other’s questions with words.

He looks over at Dean with a small nod, a shy smile.

“That's Ash and Garth. Cole and Charlie.” Dean points to them in turn. “Everyone, this is Castiel."

“Hey,” he waves a hand. They each wave back in their own manners. Charlie vigorously. Ash a two finger salute. Garth looks like he’s going to step forward and hug Castiel but Bobby intercepts him and pushes him back to the Fleetwood.

Cas stares at Dean before speaking. “No questions. I'm here for Sam.”

“Of course,” Dean says, studying him.

“Good. Just so we understand.” Then something in the doorway catches his eye. “Oh, shit. You didn't—”

Dean follows Cas’ gaze, to where a man in his early forties has walked in. Tall, barrel-chested, ice-blue eyes that hold more warmth than their color should permit.

“Well, well, well. It’s the original pirate. I thought you left us all to go fishing.” From anyone else it’d be a question but Gabe speaks like he’s merely stating facts. He, Cas and Dean walk over to the entrance and the four of them hug. Some more awkwardly than others.

Garth whispers to Bobby. “Who's that?”

“That's Benny,” he answers.

“Benny?” Coles asks, having drifted over.

“I didn’t realize anyone still had a contact number for him. But he can move through the night like a vampire.” The four men walk over and it’s Bobby’s turn to slap Benny on the shoulder and say hello.

Dean looks around, drawing them all into a close group. “Okay. We're all here. Today's Wednesday. D-Day is Friday. Eight am. That gives us two days to prep. We're going to find the ladies on our list: Find out where they live, when they're home,” he looks to Charlie, “and that they're properly insured. Let's get to work.”

“What are we doing?” Ash asks as the older group of thieves move with purpose.

“We're going shopping!” Dean points through the doorway to the break room and the tables which have been pushed together in there.

Once everyone’s relocated around the table, Bobby starts handing out old ledger books. They’re his bible. A listing of every car he knows of in the greater Seattle metro area. The Ledgers are broken up into Makes and Models and where there are enough listings, by year as well.

“There’s some double ups as I added more ledgers and split the information up, but if you see one of our ladies, write the information down on a slip of paper and give it to Charlie.” Bobby tosses a bunch of index cards into the middle of the table. “Sam said you could collate everything on that laptop of yours.”

“I can do better than that old man. I already have all the cars, with options where available. All I need is the printer Ash was meant to be setting up,” Charlie grins.

“Show me.” Dean moves to stand behind and look over her shoulder.

Bobby leans in from the other side and as Charlie scrolls through the list of cars he mutters, “Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle. Ash get the printer set up now.”

“Already done, just need to get the little lady plugged in.” Ash points to the one remaining table against the wall where a black and white inkjet printer awaits.

  


.oOo.

  


“Gabe, you’re with Garth in the Mazda. Quit your belly aching.” Bobby shuts Gabe down before he can do more than open his mouth. “The idea is to be nondescript, so no you don’t get to ride around in your bright orange Z28.” Bobby tells him as he tosses the Mazda’s keys over. “Benny you have Ash and the Taurus parked around the side.” Bobby hands the keys to Benny standing beside him. “Cas, I got you with Cole in the Cadillac.

“So that leaves me with Dean then,” Sam mutters.

“Yes it does Princess. Whatever the two of you have between you, I need you to sort your shit today. We don’t have time for your dramas tomorrow night.” Bobby tosses Dean the last set of keys and points to the car in the corner of the lot.

“How is a bright red car non-descript?” Dean curls his lip looking at it.

“You ever pay any attention to a Kia on the road?” Bobby asks him, but doesn’t wait for his answer. “Charlie’s got print outs of the list, there’s at least two, sometimes up to five options to look at. Check in on your walkie-talkies when you confirm you’ve found a likely lady.”

Charlie hands the four teams the lists and while Sam and the others are busy looking over them Dean pulls Bobby aside. It’s the first chance he’s gotten to talk with him privately.

“You called Cas,” Dean hisses, watching the others to make sure no one is paying them any mind.

“Well you weren’t going to were you?” Bobby whispers back.

Dean narrows his eyes and glares. “I went and saw him last night.”

“So I found out when I called him this morning.” Bobby doesn’t back down. “I didn’t know you’d kept in touch with Benny.”

“Yeah well, he’s the only one who ever came up and saw me in Bellingham.” Dean looks down and then over at the group, who are starting to break up. He and Bobby are out of time. “Come on Sammy, time to get going,” he calls as he walks to the Kia Rio.

The other three teams split off to their cars and they drive out of Bobby’s yard one at a time.

“Come on kid, let’s get ready for their call-ins.” Bobby stops to check on Jo on his way to his office, then shoos Charlie ahead of him.

“You know I can help right?” Jo asks as she refills the window washer tank with anti-streaking solution.

“Your mother would have my guts for garters if I let you anywhere near a stolen car.” Bobby pulls a spark plug to check its gap.

“I know, but someone needs to get them out to the cars to start with.” She pops the lid back on and looks at Bobby. “Mom’d help too if you asked her. Sam’s family.”

“Yeah he is,” Bobby agrees. He thinks about what she’s said for a moment and has to agree—the teams need to get back out as fast as they can after dropping off the cars. He nods to himself. “You’ve done good work here Jo. You okay to call the customer?”

Jo snorts, before reminding him that she’s been working the front counter since she was 16.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean lifts his walkie-talkie to his mouth and speaks into it. “How's it going?”

Gabe replies first. “It's alright.” The other two teams quickly follow suit. “Must be time for a game,” Gabe takes to the air again. “‘73 Firebird. Who drove one?”

Bobby’s voice sounds. “John Wayne in McQ.”

“That's being obscurest,” Gabe says. “Who else? Better known. Dean?”

Before Dean can answer however Cole breaks in. “Jim Rockford. In the Rockford Files.”

Dean looks over at Sam, shaking his head. “Sorry kid, that was a ‘76.”

The next voice is Ash’s. “For real?”

Then Gabe. “Yup. Dean, you want to take it?”

Sam holds his palm up indicating that Dean should answer. “Rick Springfield playing James Roberts in the 1984 movie Hard to Hold.”

Gabe calls out, “Ding, ding, ding, correct on all counts. Okay next, give me Columbo.”

Sam jumps in. “It's a 1959 Peugeot convertible, Model 403.”

“What color?” Gabe asks.

“Gray. And there were only 504 produced in France,” Sam answers.

“How do you know that?” Garth speaks for the first time.

Sam looks over at Dean and smiles. “Remember who my brother is?” he speaks into the walkie-talkie.

Dean smiles back at him, the tension between them slowly easing.

  


.oOo.

  


Charlie stands in front of a whiteboard neatly copying out the Car list. One is a ‘63 Aston Martin, DB5 Coupé. Two is a ‘99 Aston Martin, DB7. All the way through to fifty, a ‘66 Shelby AC Cobra. She leaves a blank space after the model of each car waiting for their names to come in.

Garth asked why they were naming the cars after women and he’d been told by Cas, “You say ‘Tiffany lives at such and such’ and no one listening in is the wiser.”

“Fifty ladies, fifty names, to the seeker go the spoilers. You confirm a car, you get to name her,” Bobby had added. That was all before the teams headed out of course, now Charlie stands in front of the board with a magic marker in her hand—easy to wipe off if the list needs to be destroyed in a hurry—waiting for the first names to start coming through.

The walkie-talkie beside her crackles to life with Benny’s voice. “First confirmation. Number ten, Yvonne.”

Charlie writes Yvonne on the board. After the first there is a steady string of numbers and names being relayed.

Benny again. “26, Tracy.”

Gabe. “45, Diane.”

“Give me a moment guys, I just found our Italian ladies. You ready Charlie?” Cas asks.

“Go for it,” she replies.

“Nadine just turned 19. Her older sisters are 20, Rose, and Felicity is 21. Iris is 22. Angelina is 23, Cathy 24. They’re all here with their older cousins, 29 year old Gina and 30 year old Rachel.”

“Anyone else there with them?” Charlie asks, adding Rachel’s name to the board.

“I think these ladies are more than enough, don’t you,” Cas says.

Benny yet again. “40, Carrie.”

Bobby picks up his walkie-talkie. “Come on guys, Benny’s making you all look bad here.”

Dean pipes up. “Hey Cas just found eight ladies all in one go.”

Bobby chuckles but clears his voice before speaking. “Cas found all his Italians at one home, Benny’s been doing the hard yards.” He can hear Dean grumbling in his mind but the air stays clear.

Ash chimes in with. “Sharon’s 42 and bringing meaning to my life.”

Cole. “34, Joan.”

Garth. “6, Natalie.”

Sam. “8, Madeline.”

Gabe. “41, Shannon.”

Cole. “44, Virginia.”

Garth. “14, Carol.”

There’s a lull in the names so Bobby returns them to the game. “Dukes of Hazard?”

“Fuck that shit,” Cole says.

But Ash is talking at the same time. “I know that one. General Lee, and I believe it was a Dodge Charger.”

“You ever notice how it had a different interior every week?” Gabe’s voice asks. “That bugged me.”

Cole breaks in. “Three words: Get A Life.”

Gabe. “9, Gemma.”

Sam. “18, Anne.”

“Okay, okay.” It’s Garth’s excited voice now. “What about Magnum P.I.?”

Charlie reaches for her walkie-talkie but the sound of Sam laughing beats her finger to the button. “Thanks for playing, Garth. That's a gimme.”

Bobby winks at Charlie. “Yes, but what was on the license plate?” he asks.

“The license plate?” Cole asks.

“I know. ‘ROBIN 1.’ And 3 is Alma,” from Ash.

“Very good.” They can all hear the smile in Dean’s voice. “But what was the significance of ‘ROBIN 1?’ Oh, and our last Italian of the day is 33, Veronica.”

“Veronica barely counts as Italian,” Cas cuts in. “27, Bernadene.”

“Was that his first name?” Garth’s voice.

Bobby rolls his eyes at Garth’s question. “His first name was Thomas. Thomas Magnum.”

“Thomas Sullivan Magnum, to be exact,” Gabe corrects.

“Color me impressed,” Charlie says to Bobby not bothering with the walkie-talkie.

Sam. “43, Marlene.”

“‘Robin 1’,” Bobby repeats, getting them all back on track.

Cole adds to his list. “Sweet 16, Vanessa. Wasn’t Robin the name of that guy who hung with him?”

“No,” Sam answers. “That was Higgins.”

“Jonathan Quayle Higgins.” Gabe again supplies the full name.

“You're like a serial killer, ainchoo?” Ash quips. “12, Stacey.”

“‘Robin 1’,” Bobby pulls them back.

Dean. “39, Lindsey. The name of the estate Magnum lived on was Robin’s Nest, owned by the mysterious Robin Masters. Never seen, only heard. In five episodes and voiced by Orson Welles.”

“Not entirely true brother. Robin Masters made one last ‘appearance’ played by Red Crandell. And Stefanie is having her Quinceañera soon, we should get her something nice,” Benny tells them.

“Yeah yeah yeah.” Dean sounds amused.

The names and numbers continue on late into the night, until Bobby calls them all in. “Dean, go see your Baby and meet us all back here. We have a couple of ladies we need to talk about.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean pulls into a parking garage near the Convention center. He’s not surprised to find Cas parked and waiting for him there. He pulls the Rio in next to the Cadillac.

“Are you ready for this?” Cas opens his door for him. Dean nods and they walk to the staircase. There is a pair of beeps as Dean sets the Kia’s alarm.

“What are we doing Sam?” Cole asks as they fall in behind them.

“Dean’s going to see Baby,” Sam says like it makes total sense. They follow Cas and Dean into the Hyatt and it’s parking.

“Who's ‘Baby?’” Cole asks.

“Baby is a ‘67 Chevy Impala,” Dean tells him.

“Baby is Dean's unicorn,” Cas says.

“And there she is—” Dean quickens his pace, getting ahead of the other three to approach the big black car by himself. Sam and Cas automatically stop several car lengths away. Cole halts abruptly so he doesn’t walk into them.

“Hello, Baby.” Dean’s soft voice drifts back to them. They watch as he delicately runs his fingers along her roof line.

“It looks just like a regular car—” Cole says.

Sam makes a cutting motion with his hand. “Don't go there, Cole.”

“She's not. Charlie found me a 502 big block engine. That’s normally 550 horsepower, but this sweetheart has been street modified and her output is closer to 700.”

“So she’ll fly.” Cole sounds impressed.

“She soars.” Dean moves his hand down her side and across her trunk.

“Grade-A unicorn,” Cas says.

“What's with the unicorn?” Cole now sounds confused.

“Unicorns are fabled creatures. You know, the horse with the horn? Impossible to capture?” Cas explains.

“I know what a unicorn is, why are you calling the car a unicorn?” Cole is sounding angry, feeling like he’s been patronized.

Cas rolls his eyes at Sam, making sure Cole doesn’t see him do it. “We all have one. That single car, no matter how many times you try to boost it, something happens. Cops show up, car doesn't start, owner comes back. It's voodoo.”

“See you soon, Baby,” Dean says and walks back to them.

“How long is she going to be here? I saw she has Illinois plates,” Cole asks.

“Owner’s reservation is for two weeks. They don’t leave for another nine days.”

As they walk back to the cars Cas hands his keys to Dean. “Give the Kia to Sam, we need to talk.”

Dean looks at him, but digs the keys out of his pocket and hands them to Sam. They watch as Sam and Cole get in the Rio and leave. Dean steps up to the passenger door, unlocks it and holds it open for Cas. “Your chariot awaits.” Dean closes the door after Cas and without thinking leans down for a kiss.

Catching himself he spins on his heel and slowly walks around the Cadillac. He climbs into the driver’s seat and starts the engine. Dean puts the car in reverse and turns to look out the back window, catching Cas looking at him. Dean doesn’t let himself think about the fact Cas’d been rolling the window down, the way he’d always done in the past. “Let me get us out of here first and we can talk.”

Dean gets them out of the garage and takes Pike down to 4th. Cas looks over at him, raising his left eyebrow. “Really Dean? This is how you decide to get back to Bobby’s?”

“You said you wanted to talk, this gives us time to talk.” Dean looks over momentarily and, seeing Cas’ dombrow raised to full effect, self-consciously licks his lips.

“Well I can’t argue with that.” Cas stares at Dean’s lips. “I’m riding with you tomorrow night.”

Dean pulls his eyes back to the road with difficulty. “That what you want?”

“That's what I want,” Cas confirms.

“Okay.” Dean takes a deep breath. “I missed you, you know.”

“So you mentioned in your letters,” Cas says.

“You read them?” Dean asks. “You never replied to any of them.” There is a bitterness in his voice as he says, “Never called me, never answered your phone when I called you.”

Cas doesn’t say anything for ten blocks. “We were good before you left, weren't we?”

“Very good,” Dean agrees, keeping his eyes on the road, worried what he’ll see if he looks at Cas right now.

“Because there were dark days, when I thought, ‘my God, how easy it was for him to just make a deal. Carry the burden for the whole crew. And give me up in the process.’”

“No.”

“No?”

“No,” Dean repeats. “I always thought you'd follow me.”

Cas sighs. “Don't go getting all warm and fuzzy on me, Dean. I'm the guy who was left and you're the guy who did the leaving. The only reason I’m riding with you, is ‘cause I don't want to spend the whole night with that other creep!”

“Okay,” Dean says. “Right,” and he pulls into Bobby’s yard.

  


.oOo.

  


Everyone’s back in the break room. They’ve all handed their notebooks over to Charlie and she’s sitting at one end of the table adding their information to her spreadsheets. Where ever possible she’d given them several different options for the cars on the lists. Now she’s updating her master list with the vehicles the boosters liked the most.

“Valerie is going to be trouble,” Bobby tells them.

“Valerie?” Cole asks.

“Valerie’s the 1950 Mercury Custom.” Bobby points to the white board that’s been moved in from his office.

“Right. Great car. One of a kind.” Dean grins. “They only made a handful. We're lucky there's one living in Edmonds. I cased it out back in ‘96. Didn’t take it at the time because she’s not a lady you take for a joy ride.”

“Yeah, well. She lives on Mercer Island now with District Court Judge Fergus ‘Crowley’ MacLeod. He keeps her in his living room. Like a work of art. Crowley’s put 27 miles on her odometer since he got her. Which is exactly how far he drove her when he bought her three years ago.” Bobby pauses, wanting to impress the significance. “He drove her home and hasn’t driven her since.

“The man's a freak,” Sam says. “But me and the boys already have a plan for Valerie. You don’t have to worry about her.”

Dean shrugs his shoulders and Bobby nods. “Okay, I’ll table that for now, you can fill me in later.

“Our other problem are the three Jennifers.” Bobby taps the board. “These new Mercs need laser cut keys with radio transmitters. There’s no way to get around them, we have to get keys from the dealership.”

“We have keys.” Garth stands up and walks over to where he’d left his bag by the wall.

“We do?” Gabe questions.

“Yeah man, I grabbed them when we ran on Sunday.” Garth digs around in his bag and pulls out three keys.

“Dude those cars are in the impound,” Ash says.

“Do we know which one?” Benny asks. “Because if it’s Lincoln Towing it’s back lot can be accessed from that field off Stone Ave.”

“Gimme a minute to check,” Charlie calls from her corner.

“You want us to steal cars from the impound?” Cole asks incredulously.

Sam and Dean lock eyes and shrug at the same time.

“Charlie, check and see what else they have there. If we’re doing it, we should go shopping,” Ash says.

“No, just the three Jennifers,” Cas says. “All my Italians are in the one place—”

“Except for the Maserati,” Dean says sotto voce.

Cas continues speaking like Dean didn’t interrupt. “—one group outing is enough risk. We have replacements for everything else you got but the Mercs right?” He looks between Bobby and Sam.

“Yeah we have everything covered if Sam’s plan for Valerie holds up,” Bobby confirms.

“They’re at Lincoln Towing,” Charlie says.

“Okay. Unless there’s anything else?” Cas looks at Bobby who shakes his head. “I need to go and get some sleep. I have work in the morning.” Cas stands and leaves.

Dean follows him out of the break room. “I thought you worked at Pamela’s. Since when does she open in the morning?”

“That’s my second job. I learned you need to work twice as much when it’s legit.” Cas pulls his helmet on and kick starts his bike. Dean can’t do anything but watch him ride away.

“Dean!” Bobby calls him back into the breakroom. He hands him a new list, it has all 50 cars and their addresses listed on it. “I know it’s late, but tomorrow is going to be an all-nighter, so everyone gets to go back out and visit all the ladies in person tonight,” Bobby tells them all.

“Charlie and I will sort out who’s going after what, but you all need to be familiar with these locations in case we need to change things on the fly. Cole, pay extra attention and talk to Cas when he gets off work tomorrow.”

“No, Cole’s with Sam tomorrow, I’ll let Cas know what’s what,” Dean says, looking at Sam and twitching his shoulder hoping Sam will understand he’s not rejecting him. His brother tilts his head towards the door Cas left through and Dean nods back.

Sam smiles sadly. “Okay Cole, you’re with me.” He holds his hand out with the Rio’s keys in it. “But we’re taking the Caddy.” He gives Dean his best puppy dog eyes. Dean snorts but swaps keys.

“Uhmm guys,” Cole speaks up. “The Navigator, ahh…” he looks at the board, “Kimberley. She’s in a gated community. Cas and I got in following another car. But I don’t know how successful you’re all gonna be at—” he looks down at his watch, “two in the morning, if y’all drive straight there now.”

“Did you look at what kind of gate it was? Like is it a card you tap? Or a keypad and pin?” Ash asks.

“I think it’s a transmitter, the gate was already lifting when the car we followed in turned into the driveway.” Cole says.

“Even easier,” Ash says. “I can duplicate that tomorrow—or later today. You know what I mean.”

“Alright. I’ll make sure Kimberley goes on either Cas’ or Cole’s lists, since they’re the only ones who’ll have seen it. Now, the rest of you idjits, get. You got ladies to go look at.” Bobby waves them off. 


	7. THURSDAY

Dean pulls up to his mother’s house. He swapped cars at Bobby’s before coming home, no longer in the Kia but in a boring white five year old Toyota Corolla. He drops his head in his hands when he sees the Caddy.

Inside Sam’s sitting on the floor in front of the TV playing a video game. Dean rolls his eyes and walks into the kitchen where Mary’s sitting at the table going through a photo album. Dean hangs his coat over the chair beside her and sits down.

“Hey, what are you still doing up?” he asks, leaning over to kiss her temple.

“It’s 4am sweetheart, I’ve only been home half an hour. I need a bit more time than that to unwind from a shift.” Mary makes to stand up. “Can I get you something?”

Dean puts a hand on her shoulder in a non-verbal request for his mother to continue sitting. “Nah, I’m good, what do you have there?”

“The photo album? I get nostalgic around this time of year.” She turns another page.

“What time of year?” Dean catches sight of the photos displayed on the open page and gently touches one of him as a four year old sitting on a couch holding baby Sam.

On the page opposite there’s a photo of Dean’s first day of school, He’s standing on the top step of their house, his backpack smartly over both shoulders. It would look like any other photo of a boy on his first day of school, except Dean isn’t looking at the camera, he’s looking down at Sam holding onto his leg crying.

“Days ending with a Y,” Mary murmurs as she turns the next page. One side has Sam’s first day of school. Sam and Dean are standing side by side in this photo. On the top step in front of their door. Sam’s backpack over both of his small shoulders, Dean’s just slung over the one. Sam’s not looking at the camera, rather he’s looking up at Dean who is still looking down at his younger brother.

The main difference between the two photos other than the boys ages are the smiles on their faces in the second.

The next page has, Dean knows, the last photo of the four of them as a family. It was taken July 4th, 1991. They’d been at Seattle Center with Bill, Ellen and Jo. Dean knows there is another photo from the day that a stranger had taken for them with both families together, but Ellen had taken this one because in the bottom corner was the back of Jo’s head as she tried to run forward.

Mary turned the page and there was the photo of the two families together, twelve year old Dean and eight year old Sam bracketing six year old Jo. The same way John and Bill bracketed Mary and Ellen. Everyone smiling brightly, the Space Needle in the background.

Opposite was likely the last photo of John Winchester alive. Taken on Halloween, it’s a candid shot Mary had snapped after taking a record of Sam and Dean’s costumes for the year. Dean had been dressed as Superman and after the photo he’d climbed onto the porch rail and had jumped to the ground holding his cape wide. Sam, dressed as Batman, had tried to do the same and broken his arm when he’d landed badly.

But this photo was taken in the instant before Dean had climbed up on the rail. John was standing next to a car, leaning his hip against it, ready and waiting to take the two boys out to trick and treat. Two plastic jack ‘o’ lanterns were held loosely in his left hand, a smile on his face.

Dean remembered his father’s face turning to horror as he’d jumped, remembered him running forward and past Dean. The sound of Sam crying out in pain. John pulling Sam up into his arms and carrying him to the car. 

It was the first time Dean had ever sat in the front seat, his mother driving them to the hospital, John in the back holding and rocking Sam, telling him everything would be alright.

“You ever wonder what things'd be like if he hadn't died?” Dean asks softly.

“Every day. I wonder about that every day.” She touches his face for a moment and closes the album.

“Sam and I'd probably be working at the dealership.” He grins. “Can you imagine us selling cars?”

Mary does her best salesperson impersonation. “And just in case you lose your keys, good sir, I can toss in a complimentary slim-jim, free of charge.”

Dean bursts out laughing and Mary joins him.

He reaches out and puts his hand over hers, where it’s resting on the album. “I remember, every day, he'd come home in a different car. That was the greatest thing. And we'd climb all over it. Examine every inch of every car.

“I remember supper getting cold, because the two of you would be out there with your heads stuck under hoods.” Mary turns her hand under Dean’s and squeezes.

“You remember that, Sam?” Dean calls into the lounge room.

“I was eight,” he calls back.

“After he died, I think that's what I missed most of all. That there wasn’t a different car every night,” Dean says. “When I started hanging out at Bobby's and he started showing me _things_. It was a way to kill two birds. Put food on the table for you and Sam and ride in different cars every night. Just like when Dad was here.”

“Sometimes, things happen we never see coming,” she says, reaching her hand up to Dean’s cheek.

Dean can see tears dampening his mother’s eyes but before he can react to them, Sam’s standing in the doorway.

“Ancient history's two things,” he says. “ _Ancient_ and _history!_ ” A large yawn follows his statement and Sam looks upset his announcement is being overshadowed by his own tiredness. He slumps through the kitchen and lets the backdoor slam shut behind him.

Dean watches him leave and turns back to Mary. “We're gonna have to do this thing,” he sighs.

“I know. I’m sorry, it’s not fair.” She picks the album up and stands, tucking it under one arm and hugging him from behind with the other.

“We do it. He'll get clear,” he says, holding her arm to his chest. It’s the only comfort he’ll allow himself. “Once and for all.” Dean bows his head.

Mary nods, not trusting her voice. She’s standing behind her sitting son and realizing he can’t see her, she leans down and kisses the crown of his head. The same spot she’d kissed him as a child. “Do what you need to do, keep my babies safe.” And in her mind she’s picturing not just Sam, but Dean and Castiel as well.

  


.oOo.

  


When Dean arrives back at Bobby’s the main door is closed, a sure sign the garage is closed for the day. He parks the loaner car around the side and lets himself in through the side door.

Inside he finds Sam and his crew in the breakroom where a large TV has been brought in. Sam and Charlie currently have controllers in their hands connected to an old PlayStation and they’re playing Tekken 2. “Isn’t that a little old?” Dean asks.

Ash looks up from the beanbag he’s sharing with Charlie and grins at him. “Yeah it is, but it’s the only game we can all agree on.”

“I wanted to play GTA,” Cole grumbles from the third beanbag on the other side of the one Sam is sharing with Garth. Dean mentally shakes his head trying to work out how those two even fit on one beanbag.

“Enough of that tonight.” A ball of paper gets thrown at Cole’s head from the other side of the room where Gabe and Benny are going through pages on a table against the wall. Dean walks over to them and takes a seat. “This is your list.” Gabe hands him the piece of paper he was studying.

The sheet has a list of names and addresses, but doesn’t include any car details on it. His name is written on the top of the page in green highlighter, which has also been used to mark out the names; Barbara, Annita, Baby, Carol, Angelina, Veronica and Jennifer2. 

His page also has names marked in orange; Stacey, Rose, Bernadene, Debra, Jennifer3, Shannon and Ashley. Benny pushes over a second sheet with Cas’ name in orange, with all the same cars marked in orange and green as his own.

“I’ve got Jennifer1,” Benny says, flashing his own sheet, marked in blue and orange. “Ash said he’d be able to tap into the yard’s surveillance system and loop the feed while we get the girls out.”

Dean nods as he cross checks his list against the board, seeing which ladies he’ll be picking up tonight. He’s about to complain he’s been allocated the Maserati given he’s riding with Cas, when Charlie yells as the game announces she has K.O.’d Sam’s character. “I got you!”

Bobby walks in from his office saying, “alright, play time’s over. I want you all—” he stops talking abruptly, looking at one of the tables where the detritus of a burger run is scattered across the top and his very guilty-looking dog Rumsfeld sits underneath, scraps of paper around him. “Garth,” he asks softly, “where did you put the keys for the Jennifers?”

“On the table,” Garth says, pointing to the same table where the burger wrappers have been scattered. “Oh.”

“I thought he only ate license plates?” Jo asks from the doorway into Bobby’s office.

“He’s equal opportunity,” Bobby says, reaching for his wallet. He pulls a twenty and slaps it into Garth’s hand. “Go down the street and pick up some laxatives. The rest of you, you’ve all got jobs to do, go do ‘em.” Bobby walks back into his office and shuts the door behind him.

“What am I meant to do with the laxatives?” Garth asks.

  


.oOo.

  


“Are we sure he’s in court right now?” Garth asks.

Charlie doesn’t take her eyes from the two laptops in front of her. “He’s still in session,” she says. “Even if he has his phone on him, it’ll be on silent and he won’t be able to answer.

“All you need to do is hit ‘enter’ to connect,” Charlie tells him. “Let us know when you’re ready. Guys, remember no talking while he’s on the call.” Sam and Gabe both nod. “To disconnect, just hit ‘enter’ again.”

Garth holds what looks like an old fashion rotary phone hand piece, the cord of which connects to the third laptop sitting in front of him. He nods once, twice, and hesitantly reaches towards the keyboard.

“Wait!” Gabe freezes everyone. “Garth stand up,” he commands as he gets up and walks over from where he’d been sitting. “Alright, put the hand set down and jump around a little bit with me.” Gabe grabs Garth’s hands once they’re free. “Put some music on,” he tells Charlie.

After a moment, Katrina and the Waves’ _‘Walking On Sunshine’_ starts playing from the speakers of her laptop. Gabe rolls his eyes at Charlie but, still bouncing on the spot with Garth, he starts twisting them back and forth. “Just dance it off, loosen it all up.”

When the song finishes Gabe makes a cutting motion to Charlie and the room goes quiet. “Okay, I want you to stand here.” Gabe pulls the chair all the way across the room. “Feet shoulder width apart, fists on your waist, chest thrust out and take three big breaths. Then pick up that phone and leave your message.”

Everyone watches Garth do as he’s told, picking up the handset with confidence. He hits ‘enter’ and holds his finger up to show the phone is dialing. He circles his finger as they can hear something on the line. Most likely Judge MacLeod’s voice mail message, but no one else can make out the words.

“Hello, this is a message for Mr. Fergus MacLeod, of 6610 East Mercer Way. This is Seattle Public Utilities and we're going to be doing some work in your area tonight. Please call us on 206-555-3000 and quote job number 126207 so we can discuss how this will affect you.” Garth reaches down and taps the ‘enter’ key again before carefully placing the handset on the table.

Gabe steps forward again and pulls Garth into a hug, slapping him on the back. “Good job.”

“And now we wait,” Ash says.

“Is that all you need me for?” Garth asks. “Because I need to go walk Rumsfeld.” He pulls a pair of rubber kitchen gloves from his back pocket.

  


.oOo.

  


“Sam!” Charlie calls from the breakroom. “Crowley’s court just went out of session.”

Dean follows Sam into the room and they’re joined by Gabe as Sam asks, “Are you all set up?”

“Yup, I have the diversion in place. Just need him to make the—And there it is...” She starts typing on the middle of the three laptops and then the one Garth had been using earlier starts ringing like a phone.

Charlie picks the handset up and taps the ‘enter’ key. “Seattle Public Utilities, please hold.” She taps another key and grins at the guys standing there. “What?” she asks, looking at their faces. “When have you ever called SPU and _not_ been put on hold?”

“How long are you going to leave him on hold?”

Charlie, handset wedged between her shoulder and ear, puts a finger up while she taps on the keyboard. “Thank you for waiting, how can I help you?” She waits as he speaks. “Do you have the job number?” Waits again. “Can I put you on hold while I look that up?”

They can all hear Crowley yelling no as Charlie taps the keyboard.

After ten seconds Charlie picks the call back up. “Okay, sir. I have that work order open. It seems there’s been a leak and it’s unsafe for residents to enter the area. Can I have your name and address again please?”

“Where did you put him?” Gabe whispers.

“The swankiest hotel we could find,” Sam replies, also whispering.

“Hello Judge MacLeod, okay I’m just double checking. Yes, we have a room booked for you at the Fairmont Olympic.” She pauses. “Just for the one night. We’re aware its midweek so we’ve also arranged for your clothes to be dry cleaned overnight, and you’ll have full access to room service for both dinner and breakfast, or you can charge back to your room from any of the hotels restaurants including The Georgian.” She listens to what he’s saying and holds a thumb up. They have him. “That’s exactly right, we’re covering all of those costs. The only exception is the mini-bar, I’m sorry.” He must be speaking again. “Yes I know, I agree with you fully, but unfortunately I don’t make the rules,” Charlie commiserates. “Anyway, because of the mini-bar, they’ll ask for your credit card for security purposes when you check in, but as long as you don’t use the mini-bar you won’t be charged.” She rolls her eyes. “Yes, they’re expecting you right now.” Another pause. “Thank you for being so understanding, have a great night now, good bye.”

Charlie ends the call and collapses back in her chair.

“So we’re clear?” Sam asks.

“We won’t really know for sure until he checks in, but yeah I think so,” she says. “He’s flagged to go back into court for another session, so he’ll get out of that maybe as early as four, maybe as late as five. From what I can work out, he likes to get out of the courthouse by six. It’s maybe a fifteen minute walk from the courthouse to the hotel,” Charlie tells them. “I’m setting up an alert to tell me when he’s checked in but we’re looking at maybe six-fifteen, possibly even later if he eats somewhere else before checking in.”

  


.oOo.

  


“Charlie's here.” Garth opens the main door to let her drive in.

“We sent her out on a solo boost,” Cole grins. “See what she could do.”

Charlie pulls in a gold ‘78 Lincoln Continental Mark V. “How do I look in this?” She bites her bottom lip and wiggles her eyebrows.

“Like a cheap hooker in a pimpmobile,” Cole says, getting clipped behind the ear by Gabe.

“Oi, language,” Gabe says.

“How'd it go?” Cole asks, rubbing the back of his head where Gabe smacked him.

“Keys were in it,” she replies smugly.

“Well, that defeats the point, doesn't it,” Benny says as he pulls the driver’s door open.

“Get that damn door closed,” Bobby yells as he comes out of his office with Dean. Garth re-closes the garage door.

Charlie pops the hood and trunk before she gets out of the car, and quickly moves to open the hood to look at the engine.

“This is loaded with crap,” Sam says from where he’s standing near the now-open trunk. He pulls out a set of golf clubs.

Cole, standing beside him, also pulls out something from the trunk. “Holy shit! Is this what I think it is?” He holds up a taped block of white powder.

“Let me see that.” Gabe holds out his hand for it. A small pocket knife appears in his right hand as Cole puts the brick in his left. Gabe pierces the skin and tastes the contents. He looks up at Dean and Bobby and confirms their fears. “Heroin.”

Sam reaches back into the trunk and moves a loose tarp exposing maybe two dozen similar packages.

“That's gotta be at least a million there,” Gabe says looking down at the bags.

Cole let’s out a whoop. “We're rich. Goddamn, we're rich!”

“Where'd you pick her up?” Dean’s standing beside Charlie.

“In front of one of them poker parlors in Chinatown.”

“Cole, figure out which one and take it back,” Dean orders.

“Take it back? What do you mean take it back? Are you crazy, man?” Cole asks, not believing his ears.

“Take it back,” Dean repeats.

“Hey, now, Dean. C'mon man,” Cole says. “That’s a lot of money that just fell in our laps.”

Gabe moves to put the brick he’s holding back in the trunk but Cole snatches it out of his hand. Gabe makes to grab the bag back from Cole, but he holds on. They tug back and forth and the bag starts to split, spilling the heroin on the ground behind the car.

Cole whines, “Now, see what you—”

But banging on the main door freezes them all.

“Who is it?” Bobby calls out.

“Mills.”

“Jesus,” Gabe curses and puts the now uncontested brick back in the trunk, flicking the tarp over them all. Sam drops the golf bag back on top. They close the trunk and lean back against it.

Cole hurries to the bench on the side where he’s laid out a bunch of tools obviously used for boosting cars and starts stuffing them in drawers.

On the bench beside him Ash is dumping all the walkie-talkies from the night before that he had been modifying into a tub and throwing it under the bench, dumping his jacket over it. Benny rushes over and throws his coat on top too.

At the same time Charlie heads into the break room where she closes all the laptop screens and spins around the whiteboard. The reverse side has a diagram of a combustion engine drawn on it, covered in notes that two or three people have written over, if the hand writing and marker colors are anything to go by.

“One minute!” Bobby calls out while they’re all scurrying around hiding the evidence of the boosts they have planned for the night.

Bobby waves to Dean to go and open the door. Dean jogs over to the side door, but looks back quickly before opening it and spots the small pile of white powder under the Lincoln. He points to his eyes with the first two fingers of his hand then points those fingers to Gabe and Sam, then deliberately in slow motion moves his fingers down to the heroin on the ground. There's no time to clean it up, Dean can only hope the two of them do something.

He opens the door, coming face to face with Jody Mills. “I know you,” she says.

“You know my back,” he replies and turns it to her, walking back into the center of the work shop, eyes darting to where the heroin pile is, but Gabe’s moved over a step and is hiding it behind his crossed ankles.

“What’re you still doing here, Dean?” Mills only follows him part way into the open space before she drifts off to one side.

“I stopped by to see Bobby. Say hello.” Dean deliberately stands on Sam’s right side in an attempt to draw the Detective’s attention away from Gabe.

Mills looks at Bobby. Bobby grins. Mills continues walking around the garage. Taking it all in, benches and cars. “What's this?” She points to the Continental.

“It’s a Mark V,” Bobby says.

“Bobby,” she verbally rolls her eyes at him while she’s looking at the bench Ash has cleared. “What's wrong with it?”

“Needs brightening.” Bobby pulls a rag from his pocket and walks over to the gold car and starts rubbing the roof.

Mills eyes him with suspicion and walks around to where she can see the front of the vehicle, taking out her walkie-talkie on the way. “Run a plate for me. 1A B2676. Lincoln.” She clicks off.

“No faith in our new-found goodness, Detective?” Bobby asks.

“Sure I have, Bobby. But sometimes we need to create some numbers.” She grins at him. “Task force runs on statistics, you know.”

Before any of them can respond, the radio crackles. “1A B2676. There's no BOLO on that license at this time.”

Mills stares at the car, unconvinced.

“You're thinking: Okay, there's no BOLO. Maybe they stripped its guts and crated them up.” Dean walks up the length of the driver’s side and stops at the door.

“Something like that.” She looks at Dean with obvious distrust.

Dean opens the driver's side door and gestures for Mills to come around and get in. She shrugs her shoulder and steps around, getting behind the wheel.

“Let her rip.” Dean points to the keys still in the ignition.

Mills starts the car. Dean looks up at Gabe still standing at the tail end of the vehicle. He looks down and subtly shakes his head, just the once.

“Come on Jody, open her up. You’re sitting in a Bond car right now,” Sam encourages her as he walks up to the open car door.

She pulls her foot from the throttle. “You don’t honestly expect me to believe that do you?” Mills asks incredulously.

“God’s honest truth,” Sam says, but Dean’s also speaking at the same time.

“This is _not_ a Bond car,” Dean disagrees.

“Is to,” Sam says. “Lincoln Continental. It’s the car they loaded up with bullion in _‘Goldfinger.’_ ”

“Sammy, Sammy, Sammy,” Dean says shaking his head. “That was a ‘64 this is a ‘78. They’re so not the same car.”

“Whatever,” Sam says. “Open her up Jody, show my know-it-all brother what this car really sounds like.”

She shakes her head, chuckling, but gives into Sam’s puppy dog eyes and really revs the engine. Dean flicks his eyes up to Gabe, who’s taken a step to the side and widens his eyes slightly at Dean, before strolling away.

“Alright that’s enough of this.” Jody turns the car off and climbs out of it once the two brothers back up and give her the space to do so. “Dean, walk with me for a moment.” She heads to the still ajar side door, not checking to see if Dean’s following her. Trusting, just this once, he’ll do as she asks. She pauses outside in the sunlight until he catches up with her.

“Why are you still here, Dean?” she asks.

“I couldn’t come all this way and not see all my family, Jody,” he answers.

Jody puts her detective face back on and tells him, “Six years ago, I let you go free. But the next time… The next time sends you away for a long, long time. I don’t want to be packing up my car every other month with magazines and peanut M&Ms to drive down to Cedar Creek and come see you in your bright orange jumpsuit. ” She looks hard at him until he shuffles his feet. Nodding to herself, she walks off out of the yard and climbs into a waiting unmarked police car.

Jody turns to her partner as Donna pulls away from the curb. “Whatever is going down, it’s happening tonight.”

“How do you know that Jodes?”

“They’d cleaned up most of their preparations but they missed a piece of paper listing all the call frequencies for all the surrounding PDs.”

“You want us to get them all changed?” Donna asks.

“No. No, if they don’t hear normal chatter they’ll get spooked and go to ground.” Jody looks out at the surrounding buildings they’re driving past, thinking. “Take me back to the precinct, I need to get a team together for tonight. Then I want you to come back here and sit on them. Don’t be obvious about it, but let them lose you when they start heading out. I want them comfortable.”

Meanwhile, Dean waits and watches until the car disappears down the road and he heads back inside. “Cole, get that fucking car out of here.”

At the side bench, Ash is pulling the walkie-talkies he’d been working on earlier out again. Dean stops by him. “What are you up to over here anyway?” He picks up one of them. It’s been pulled apart and taped back together around some dodgy looking work Ash has done to it.

“Scramblers. I know you guys have your code names and shit, but I get these all done before we go out tonight? Gives us another level of protection,” Ash explains distractedly as he re-lays out the remaining eleven units he’s still working on.

  


.oOo.

  


After he returns from getting rid of the Continental, Cole is back at his bench putting together a bunch of different carry bags. Each gets a variety of tools: slim-jims, modified based on the type of cars they're going after, gizmos, screwdrivers, a ratchet, a dent-puller, a mini-battery with pointy leads.

He looks up and out of a window and, calling Ash over, he points at something outside. Dean, catching the movement, walks over to see what they’re looking at. Across the road and a ways down the street is a car.

Dean recognizes it as the one Detective Mills had gotten into earlier, and the blonde woman still sitting in the driver’s seat looks like the other Detective who had been with Jody on Tuesday. What was her name? Donna. Donna Something-starting-with-a-H.

And sitting with her, is that their old pal Dobbs? “Hey Gabe, come over here,” Dean calls across the floor.

“What do you want?” he asks when he reaches Dean’s side.

“Guy sitting in the car with the blonde, you recognize him?”

“Officer Dobbs,” Gabe confirms.

“Jo, get over here.” He waits until she’s standing beside him, having shooed the others away with the kits Cole’s put together. “See that unmarked cop car over there? We're going to need to shake them tonight. I'm making that your problem.” He looks down at her. “That's called delegation of duties. You like it?”

Jo regards the cops. “Can I have Charlie?” Dean looks at her a moment. “I’m not going to have her do anything illegal promise.” 

“Okay, but we need her at the dock,” he tells her.

“Sure thing,” she says.

  


.oOo.

  


It’s just turned 6pm, everyone’s in the workshop and there’s an argument brewing.

“Charlie’s right, Dean. We need another driver for the Italians,” Cas is saying.

“There’s eight ladies and eight of us, how is this an argument?”

“Because the layout of the building means unless you’re willing to leave the roller door wide open, there’s no way to close it and get the last car out, unless you have a ninth person with you,” Charlie speaks confidently and places a rough diagram of the building they’re picking the Italians up from.

Cas pokes his finger at a seemingly random square on the paper. “This is where the control panel is. And with the type of door that’s installed, whoever hits ‘close’ needs to shotgun a waiting car to get out of there before the door closes.” Cas drags his finger to an opening in the outside rectangle. “Charlie and I have been over this, there’s not enough time for one person to close the door and drive out on their own.”

A fog horn sounds from the break room and Charlie woops as she jogs to it. “We’re in the clear,” she yells back out to them. She reappears in the doorway saying, “Crowley just checked in.” She walks over to Sam holding her hand up for him to high-five, but he picks her up and spins her around instead.

Dean reaches over and musses up Charlie’s bright red hair before walking off, escaping from the argument. Cas’ narrowed blue eyes follow him.

  


.oOo.

  


Outside, Donna and Roy are still sitting in their car waiting for someone, anyone, to leave Singer Automotive. A woman arrived driving a minivan about half an hour ago and was let into the building. Earlier in the afternoon a couple of guys had parked a Corolla around the side and entered through the side door. The most exciting thing to happen had been some gangly kid taking a fat dog for a walk around the block.

Donna checks the time. It’s just after seven o’clock. Sunset was roughly ninety minutes ago and it’s near enough to nevermind full dark now. She looks up in time to see a black Rover pulling into the lot. Three men, one with a pronounced limp—Donna thinks it might be Victor Henriksen—get out and walk through the side door. 

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s about to point out Charlie is 15 years old, and in no way is she going to be in any of the boosted cars tonight. It’s bad enough she’s going to be at the dock.

Actually, Dean’s having second thoughts about that too and wants to talk to Bobby about Charlie staying here and Bobby going to the dock instead, when he catches the side door opening.

Victor and another of Roman’s goons, Dean thinks his name’s Edgar, flank Richard Roman as he enters. The Edgar goon waits by the doorway watching the workshop as Victor moves to the side and leans against the wall. Dick casually walks over to their group.

Sam, standing opposite Dean, spots Roman. “Oh, shit.” 

“Is this is how you're spending my time? Standing around with your thumbs up your asses?” Roman asks calmly.

“Everyone know Dick Roman? Pillar of the community.” Dean’s itching to move from where he is to physically stand in between Roman and Sam, but he’s worried whatever progress he’s made over the past couple of days with Sam will disappear if he makes such a blatant move.

“Look at this. A multi-generational gathering of scumbags,” Roman continues, gesturing around the room.

“So saith the King of Scumbags,” Bobby mutters loud enough to be heard by everyone.

“Hello, Bobby. My boys at the dock report no cars have as yet been delivered.” Roman looks down at his watch. “And there's less than 13 hours to go.”

“Getting nervous, Dick? What happens to you, I wonder, if delivery isn't made?” Bobby steps forward, placing himself between Roman and both Sam and Dean.

Roman ignores him, looking over Bobby’s shoulder at Sam. “With all the free time I've had, not counting cars as they're being loaded onto my ship, I've managed to sand the cedar inside your box, Sam. This’ll protect you from the anaerobic bacteria, which normally thrive in an airless environment. Thus prolonging decay.” He smiles as Benny and Gabe grab hold of Dean.

“Get out of here, Dick,” Bobby says.

“Twelve hours, fifty-six minutes—”

Roman doesn’t get any further in his count down when Dean snarls.

“Get out!”

“I hope you know what you're doing.” Roman’s oily smile is back. “God help you—sorry—God help Sam, if you don't.” With that he leaves, his henchmen moving to follow him out the door but Roman stops Victor, saying something Dean can’t hear. Roman and Edgar leave, Victor shoots Dean an apologetic look as he walks over to their group.

“Asshole,” Bobby says, nodding his head towards the door, making sure Victor knows it’s not directed at him.

“So you’re here to watch us I take it?” Dean asks.

“Sorry, Dean,” he says.

“Nah, you’re good man, actually you just solved a problem for us,” Dean says.

“He did?” Charlie asks.

“How do you feel about taking an Italian out tonight?” Dean asks. “You just need to walk in and drive out.”

Victor looks at his old crew; Cas, Gabe and Benny, meeting each of their gazes, before looking at Dean. At their smiles, he ducks his head and pinches the bridge of his nose before looking back up and agreeing. “Yeah, I think I can do that.”

“Good, Cas’ll take you through the plan. Bobby, I want to chat to you in your office. Everyone else, we still have some time to kill before we can start. So double check everything.” Dean leaves them all in the garage and heads into Bobby’s office.

  


.oOo.

  


“Okay, all our ladies should be home now, tucked in bed. Let's keep our cool. Think slow. Move fast. Charlie, you’re first out tonight, in the bright red Kia. There’s a cop car out there waiting for us to move, so you’re the bait. If they follow you, you drive them around for 20 minutes and get back here,” Dean calmly explains what he needs her to do. “Try to look like you’re trying to lose them, but best case scenario they follow you back here. If they don’t follow you, or you do lose them, stick to the plan, drive around, come back here after 20 minutes.

“Jo; you’ll be in the Corolla and you’re going to follow Charlie out. If the cops don’t take her bait, I want you to make sure they take yours. Do whatever it takes to get them to follow you, but don’t make them pull you over. Nothing reckless. Lose them and get to the dock.

“Bobby; you’re taking Benny, Ash and Garth in the Buick. Once you’ve dropped Benny and Ash off I want you to double back around with Garth and be ready to pick them up if everything goes to shit. Once they’re in, let Garth out and get over to the dock. You’re our eyes and ears there, and Jo’s going to need the Buick for when we start rolling in.

“Ellen; you’re in the minivan and you’ve got the rest of us. We’re going to give Bobby a head start, but we need to be long gone from here before Charlie gets back potentially with her tail. Once Benny and Ash are in, drop us off at the roller door and get over to the dock and wait for us.”

Dean looks at the group of people surrounding him, everyone seems calm and ready to go. Eight boosters, two runners and two support. It’s a big crew, but they have a lot of work to get through tonight. And even though the weight of eleven people sit on his shoulders, he’s confident they’re going to get through this.

“Okay, we just got one more thing to do.” Dean looks at Gabe. “You’re on,” he tells him.

Gabe grins and reaches over to the moveable tool chest he’d pulled to the center of the room and the old fashion boom box sitting on top of it. “Here’s a little something that I prepared earlier for you all.” He points towards Garth, Ash and Cole. When he presses play _‘Eye of the Tiger’_ blasts from the speakers.

  


.oOo.

  


Sam, Dean and Cas stand side by side as they watch Bobby reverse the Buick out with Benny riding shotgun and Ash in the back. Cole calls out he’s riding shotgun as he walks toward the minivan.

“I don’t fucking think so,” Ellen laughs at him. “You and Gabe are in the back with Sam in the middle, Cas and Dean have the middle and Victor’ll be up front with me.”

“Why the hell does he get to ride up front?” Cole grumbles.

Dean, who’s been watching this exchange, goes to say something when Cas beats him to it. “You’re in the back with Gabe because you’re the two shortest guys here. So shut up and get in.” He pulls the sliding door open and jerks his thumb indicating for Cole to get in.

He grabs his sling bag and huffs as he climbs into the back of the ‘99 Dodge Grand Caravan. “Ain’t you pissed at all being sat back here like we’re kids?” he asks as Gabe grabs his canvas messenger bag and follows Cole in.

“Suck it up, buttercup.” Gabe grins at Cas still standing beside the door. “I’m plenty big enough where it counts.” Cas rolls his eyes at the shorter man.

Sam enters next, sitting between the two. By taking the middle, as Ellen suggested, he’s able to stretch his legs between the two seats Dean and Cas have been assigned. He tucks his leather bag under his legs and slaps Cole on his thigh. “Lighten up Cole,” he tells him.

Meanwhile Victor’s limped over and taken the front passenger seat and Ellen’s started the engine waiting for Cas to get in. Dean waits until she’s out of the garage and closes the main door after her. There’s no one left behind so he locks the door from the inside and exits through the side door, which Charlie was given keys for.

Dean jogs around to the front of the building and pulls the gates closed, looping the chains through them. As he slides into his seat and pulls the door closed behind him everyone’s walkie-talkies crackle to life and Charlie’s voice echoes from six different speakers. “Is everyone clear? I’m maybe two minutes out.”

“Everyone but Ellen turn their radios off while we’re in her car,” Sam orders as Dean shuffles his duffle bag around under his feet. Ignoring his own order, he replies to Charlie so Ellen can concentrate on pulling out, getting them on the road and heading towards SEA-TAC. “We’re all out of the house, Charlie. You’re fine to come home.” He turns his unit off.

Ellen reaches over and slides a cassette into the player, and Dean groans when Janis Joplin starts singing Mercedes Benz. “What’s your rule again, Dean?” Sam asks him from the back seat.

“Driver picks the music,” he answers sullenly, refusing to give voice to the rest, since he isn’t sitting shotgun.

  


.oOo.

  


Bobby drops Benny and Ash out in front of the warehouse holding all the Italians and it isn’t long before Benny’s standing beside Ash as he’s cutting into the building’s security system. They find the access box exactly where Cas and Charlie said it would be, right in the middle of a long and exposed wall where they’re standing out in the open.

Ash has two wires alligator-clipped into the box and he’s holding what he called ‘a crap piece of SIMpad’ which he’d ripped apart and rebuilt using his own personal version of Linux. Ash’s fingers are flying over the touchscreen and approximately twenty seconds after Benny popped the box open Ash is telling Benny to open the door.

Ash pulls his wires out of the security box and dashes through the door Benny’s holding open. He can hear the older guy radioing they’re in when he reaches the central pillar with its control panel. Ash flicks on the emergency lights as he presses the button to open the roller door.

By the time the door’s at waist level there are seven men crouching down and entering the warehouse. It’s a huge parking garage filled with exotic cars. Ash can see more cars here from their list than just the eight Italians they’re going to be driving out.

Roller door open, Ash scans for the car he’s been allocated. Gina is an ‘88 Countach, one of the two Lamborghini’s on the list. Rachel, the ‘90 Diablo will be driven out by Cole and they’re currently parked side by side. Unlike the Ferraris, they don’t require Cas’ specialist equipment so they’re out and on the road first.

Cas stops by the ‘02 Spyder 360 just inside the door. Garth was meant to be taking her, but Cas waves him off over to the ‘99 Maranello 550, calling Victor to the closest car so he can get out quickly.

Cas, holding a second bag full of his own tools he wouldn’t let anyone else touch, leans into the car and releases the hood. Fingers reaching in, he lifts the hood to expose the engine. A black box twice the size of one of Charlie’s power-packs for her laptops comes out of his bag. The prancing horse is proudly emblazed on its side. 

Cas connects it to the motor and tells Victor to open up Cathy and get in. A yard-long cable ending in a racing starter is attached next and, with a push of Cas’ thumb, Victor is revving the engine and ready to go. Cas pulls his gear out, closes the hood and walks to the next car.

Sam’s standing beside Felicity, a ‘95 355B. Like Cathy before her, she’s the traditional Ferrari red, as are most of the ladies they’re taking from here, except for the yellow Countach Ash drove out, the purple Diablo Cole’s in, and the pure black Testarosa Cas will drive himself.

Cas grins through the windshield at Sam when he drops the hood back in place. This is Cas’ happy place, and he lets his fingers trail along her lines as Sam leaves. The next closest cars are Nadine (’67 275 GTB4 Hardtop, with Benny leaning against her), Iris (’97 355 F1, Gabe’s standing at her hood, waiting) and now Garth’s Maranello.

Cas gets them started, each one faster than the next as he hits his stride. He’s been in the warehouse all of five minutes as he walks to Rose, his ‘87 Testarosa, where Dean is waiting for him.

Cas pops the hood and, with Dean sitting in the driver’s seat, gets her started. It’d make more sense at this moment for Cas to head to the control panel as he stows his gear, but Dean knows this is Cas’ car and he’s out and across the floor while Cas’ still dropping the hood.

Gear packed, Cas slips into Rose and eases her up beside where Dean stands waiting. Leaning across, Cas opens the passenger door and asks, “Going my way?”

Dean smirks, hits the button to close the roller door and dives into the Ferrari, Cas already sneaking under the closing door before Dean can pull his seat belt on.

“Did you see them all?” Cas asks as they leave the warehouse behind, looking as untouched as when they first arrived. “So. Beautiful,” he speaks softly.

“I know baby,” Dean says smiling at Cas. They take the fastest route from the airport to the pier, but obey all road rules, not wanting to garner any more attention than their lady is already getting.

Seventeen minutes and they’re the last to check in with Bobby, who radios through to Charlie back at the garage with the white board. She uses a handful of paper towel to run a line through the eighth car to be turned over to Roman’s crew for loading.

Cas grabs his specialist pack out from the passenger foot well and follows Dean over to where Ellen is waiting for them. He takes the same seat he used for the drive to SEA-TAC, Ash behind him and Dean, with Benny in shotgun.

Jo’s already left in the Buick with Sam, Gabe, Garth and Cole. They’re headed to Crowley’s to pick up Valerie. The plan is, once Sam is on the road, Jo will pick up the other three and drop them with Alma, Gemma and Kate.

  


.oOo.

  


Jo pulls in to SE 68th Street and lets them out at the corner of 96th Ave SE, which she’ll turn down and work her way back to E Mercer Way from. The four guys walk into the trees and find Crowley’s driveway, following it up to his house.

Gabe pulls his radio out and calls through to Charlie. “Hey Red, we’re ready for you out here.”

“You’re at Valerie’s?” she replies.

“Just walking up to the front door now,” Sam confirms, stepping under the portico. The front door opens in front of him. “Thank you, Charlie.”

“I just dropped Benny and Ash off with Marsha.” Ellen’s voice cuts through their banter.

The four guys walk into Crowley’s foyer and Cole whistles, reaching to pick up a cut crystal bowl sitting on the side board. Gabe flicks the back of his ear. “No touching, we’re just here for the car.” He walks into the formal entertaining area to the right of the entrance way where the 1950 Mercury Custom is sitting in pride of place. “So what’s the plan here Sam?”

“The plan is we steal the car,” Cole follows him, rubbing at his ear.

“No shit Sherlock,” Gabe snaps. “Look, I know you had a plan that involved the three of you. We’re all here now, what’re we doing?”

Sam’s been ignoring them all as he runs his hand along the Custom’s lines. He lays down on the floor and visually makes a scan under the car. Liking what he sees he climbs back to his feet and gently tries the door handle. It opens on well-oiled hinges.

Garth stands in the foyer still. “In the original plan I was Jo,” he tells Gabe. “I was meant to drop Sam and Ash off, and once they had the car, follow them back in.”

“So why are we here then?” Gabe asks.

“No idea,” Cole says as Sam starts the car. “I do want to know how you’re planning to get the car out of here though.” He directs this last to Sam.

Sam grins at him as he climbs back out of the car and drops the tools he used in his bag. “I have a tool.”

“No Sam,” Garth says. “No, that’s not a tool.”

“I have Marsha and I’m taking Ash to his date.” Benny announces over the radio.

“What’s not a tool?” Gabe looks towards Sam to see what he has, in time to see Sam throw a brick through Crowley’s full-sized floor to ceiling windows. “Yeah, that’s not a tool.”

“This is,” Sam says as he pulls a tire iron out of his bag and walks to the window knocking out the remaining loose shards.

“Dean and Cas have been dropped off and I’m heading back to the barn,” Ellen says over the radio.

“Barn?” Garth asks.

“The pier. Better to say barn if anyone’s listening.” Sam drops the iron back in his bag and picks the bag up before getting in the car. “We have Valerie,” he says into his radio. “Garth, Gabe get back out to the road for Jo to get you. Cole, you go with them. This lady’s going to attract too much attention as it is, without me dropping you off on my way.” He shuts the door and eases the car forward and over the window sill and onto the front patio.

They watch as he drives away.

“Red, did you know about the window?” Gabe speaks into his walkie-talkie.

“Window?” she asks. “Oh! I see. Well shit. Shut any internal doors you can, and I’ll try and disable the sensors in that zone until morning when I release the worm.”

Cole’s already shutting as many doors as he can see. Gabe looks at Garth. “Are we sure about these little stick on things?” he’s referring to the patches Ash stuck on all their fingers earlier, covering their prints rather than them needing to wear gloves.

“Yeah, they work like a charm.” Garth shuts the front door and pulls the double doors from the entry way into the Mercury’s display room closed.

“Come on old man, we’ve been here too long.” Cole steps out of the smashed window and towards the same trees they walked through to get here.

“I’m 90 seconds from you,” Jo announces, “and I’m not waiting for anyone not there.”

Gabe and Garth sprint after Cole.

“Dean’s taking Annita home, and I’ve just picked up Stacey,” Cas’ voice sounds even deeper over the radio. Gabe, Garth and Cole are safely back in the Buick with Jo, leaving Mercer Island.

“I’ll drop Cole off on our way to Alma, and if you can take Garth to Stefanie. I’ll head back to the barn and be waiting there when you arrive,” Jo tells Gabe, who’s sitting in the front with her.

“Sounds good,” he agrees.

“Why am I stuck in the back again,” Cole whines like the child he’s complaining he’s being treated like.

“Age _and_ beauty before—” Gabe looks Cole up and down pointedly, “—well, you.”

  


.oOo.

  


Benny’s first back to the pier after their second outing and, as he waits for Ash to get in, he chats with Bobby. “Tracy’s a two-hour run, up to Everett and back. How about instead of Ellen taking us up, I drive the Corolla you have sitting here?”

“And just stash it somewhere up there?” Bobby asks.

“Means Ellen stays down here and keeps people moving,” Benny says.

“What about if Sam and Cole take the Corolla? It’ll add some time to their Edmonds run to take you and Ash up to Everett, but I’ve got more chance of getting the Corolla back if Sam leaves it in Edmonds.”

“That’ll add an extra half hour for Sam.”

“But it saves tying Ellen or Jo up for 90-odd minutes getting them up there. And yes, you could take them, but I don’t want to recover a burnt-out husk instead of a Corolla.” Bobby sees Sam and waves him over. He explains the plan succinctly to the younger Winchester.

Sam looks at his watch. “We going to make it?”

“Too early to tell. But if we’re going to make this play, best to do it now when we have time,” Bobby says.

“You nervous brother?” Benny asks him.

“Nah,” Sam responds.

“That's strange. I'm nervous. Bobby's nervous. Everyone's nervous. But not you,” Benny teases him.

“Whatever will be will be,” Sam says.

“That's a good attitude, Sam,” Bobby tells him. “For everything but stealing cars.”

Before Sam can reply, Ash pulls up to them in the ‘57 Chrysler Convertible. “Charlie, I just put Stefanie to bed,” He calls over the walkie-talkie. “Hey guys,” he says as he gets out.

“Ash, you’re in the Corolla with Sam, Benny and Cole when he gets in.” Bobby tosses him a set of keys. “It’s parked up around the side, go bring it ‘round.”

“Sweet.” And Ash is off.

Bobby walks away from Benny and Sam over to where Ellen and Jo are waiting for their passengers. He explains what’s happening and gets Gabe and Garth into Ellen’s van and out of the yard. It’s going to be a long night, and he needs to keep everyone moving.

Anytime people are hanging out at the pier, they’re not bringing the ladies in.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean finds himself in the front of the Buick with Jo. He’d rather be in the back with Cas, but then Jo would be up front by herself, and well, Dean doesn’t want to listen to whatever snide comments she’s likely to make.

Dean’s other wish is to swap this run with anyone else and avoid taking Cas anywhere near the Maserati Jo’s driving them to. At least after getting Veronica, Dean gets to leave Cas with an S type Jaguar. That should clean the sour taste from his mouth.

Ellen lets them know she’s left Gabe and Garth near Lynn—a Silver Wraith built in 1950—and she’s heading back to the barn.

“You know she doesn’t count as an Italian.” Cas drops the non sequitur into the car.

“I know,” Dean agrees.

“Why not? Maserati’s an Italian company,” Jo asks and Dean covers his face.

“They’re a poor man’s Ferrari, Jo. To call them _an Italian_ is…” Cas trails off. “Well it’s just wrong.”

“But they’re still Italian.” Dean isn’t sure if Jo is genuinely puzzled by Cas’ statements, or if she’s shit-stirring knowing she can wind Cas up now, but it’s going to be Dean weathering the storm.

“Change of plan,” Dean cuts in. “Take us to Debra. Cas can drop me off for the buzz-box afterwards.”

Dean sees Cas narrowing his eyes behind Jo, but he nods in agreement, so Jo makes a few turns to get them headed in their new direction. By the time they’re being dropped off both Garth and Gabe have checked in saying they’re heading back to the barn.

Dean slings his duffle over his shoulder and sticks his head back in Jo’s car as Cas slams the rear door closed. “Look after yourself, okay? Don’t take any risks tonight.” She raises two fingers in salute and he listens to her over the radio saying he and Cas are on foot.

They walk a little ways down the road and find Debra in her driveway. Cas is already sitting in the driver’s side before Dean has circled around to the passenger side. They’re reversing before Dean has his door closed.

  


.oOo.

  


Cas is pulling into the parking lot for an apartment complex when they see a guy walk out of the building and right up to the Maserati they’re here for Dean to steal. Cas slows and performs a three-point turn, reversing into an empty spot as they watch the guy get into the low silver car and drive out.

“Cas,” Dean says lowly.

“Yeah yeah,” he pulls back out, lights off and follows the car a couple of blocks, waiting until they’re in some traffic before popping the headlights back on.

“Where’s this guy going so late on a Thursday night?”

“I don’t know, that’s why we’re following him,” Cas shoots Dean a blistering look.

Dean picks his radio up. “We just caught Ronnie going out for a walk, thoughts on following or picking her up later?”

“We got time to let her do her thing. Go pick up Barbara instead,” Bobby’s voice comes back to them after a minute.

“Where’s Barb from here?” Dean asks Cas.

“She’s only a few blocks over,” he replies already taking a corner, forgetting about Veronica.

  


.oOo.

  


Charlie’s got the music turned up and is dancing around the breakroom like no one’s watching her. Which is fair, since no one is. On one side of the room all the mismatched tables have been pushed against the wall, on the other is the white board, and in her hands are a pen, a ball of paper towel and a walkie-talkie which is crackling to life. She holds it up to her ear and bites the lid off her pen.

“I’ve just left with Hillary, we’re 20 minutes out,” Cole says. Charlie runs a line through the words 2001 Lexus LX470 and Hillary, then carefully lines the marker back up with the lid still between her teeth.

“Diane and I are back, and I can see lights turning in behind me.” From Sam

“That’d be me,” Gabe says. “I have Erin with me.” Charlie uses the paper towel ball to wipe out Sam’s 2000 Porsche 911 Cabriolet and Gabe’s ‘66 Camaro Z28.

As she’s about to dance away again another call comes in from Dean saying he’s got Carol squared away. So she erases the ‘98 Corvette C5 too. 


	8. FRIDAY

Bobby watches the clock as Thursday turns to Friday. Over the next two hours, Madeline, Yvonne, Megan, Natalie, Laura, Lindsey, Virginia and Veronica—finally—are all brought in and the guys head back out again. “What’s the count Charlie?”

“36 in, 14 to go.”

“Okay boys, you heard her, we’re doing real well so far. Remember, slow and steady wins the race.”

  


.oOo.

  


Cas, Dean and Ash are all squeezed into the back of Jo’s Buick. Benny, bear of a man that he is, is sitting shotgun. Ash, as the skinniest, has the middle seat and Dean spends the whole ride to Lincoln Towing trying not to glare at him.

It isn’t Ash’s fault, Dean reminds himself. Ash was trying to be nice offering to sit in the middle. He even has his oversize back pack on his lap, which he’s hugging close.

Dean wishes it was Cas’ thigh pressed up against his, not Ash’s. Jo drives past Lincoln Towing and takes the next right, only to find the next right, Stone Ave, is signposted as a dead end.

“Ah, Benny,” Jo says as she coasts the Buick further along the road. “Didn’t you say there was a field down there? Because I’ve been here before and that’s a golf course, and there’s no car access into it from Stone Ave.”

“No, there isn’t,” Benny agrees, opening his door. “But the rear gate into Lincoln Towing is piss easy to get through, and who was going to agree to that?” He gets out of the car and opens Dean’s door for him. “Everybody out, this is our stop.”

Ash follows Dean out his side of the car, but Cas exits on the other. Jo asks if they want her to stay close for now and Dean agrees. 

“I’ll be no more than five minutes, but call fast, call early, if you need me.” She pulls out onto the road and Dean turns to follow Benny and Ash back to Stone Ave.

“You got your magic box from earlier?” Benny’s asking Ash.

“It’s a computer, it’s not magic,” he replies.

Cas moves to beside Dean. “Can’t say I would have agreed if I knew we were going in through the front door.”

“Back door, and I thought that was your thing,” Benny tosses over his shoulder.

“Benny,” Dean says warningly.

“Calm down brother, I didn’t mean anything by it,” Benny replies. They follow the road almost all the way down to the end, passing a small building with a sign saying Robert’s Custom Cabinetry. On the other side, there’s a security gate with an access panel. “Think you can open it?” he asks Ash.

The radio in Dean’s hand sounds with Ellen’s voice. “I’ve left Gabe and Garth with Bernadene.”

“Piece of piss, just like you said.” It barely takes Ash any time at all to get the gate to open. Dean, Cas and Benny slip through as soon as the gap is wide enough. “Destiny.” Ash grins to himself.

The three split up looking for the three Mercedes. Cas goes left, Benny right, and Dean heads up the middle. He’s about halfway up the lane between rows of cars when a soft double pip whistle sounds from his left. Another sharper whistle questions from his right, but Dean’s already heading to Cas.

The two pips sound again and Dean pulls the key from his pocket as he reaches Cas’ side. Less than a minute later Benny joins them. “On three. One. Two…” Three cars chirp as their alarms are disengaged and their doors unlock.

Dean checks the plates and moves to the correct car for his key, slipping inside. The plush leather seat cradles him in luxury as he starts the engine. He waits for Cas to pull out and leaves Benny to follow since he’ll need to stop at the gate to get Ash. “We have the Jennifers.” He calls over the radio.

  


.oOo.

  


Gabe and Garth are sitting in a ‘94 Jaguar XJ 220. Gabe pulls a tiny screwdriver out of his pocket and removes three screws from the Jag's ignition, pulling the whole cylinder out. He pulls another from his pocket and slides it into place, tightens the three screws and uses his own key to start the car.

“You ever feel bad about any of this?” Garth asks him.

“Of course not. I'm Robin Hood. I take from the rich and give to the needy.” Gabe grins at him as he pulls the car out of its bay and heads to the down ramp.

“You mean the poor?”

“No. The needy. Us. Because we need this car!” They reach the exit of the parking garage and Gabe slows to check traffic when a gun is jammed against his temple.

“Out of the car, bitch, or I blow your fucking head off!” the stranger yells.

Gabe looks at the carjacker. Surprised to see it’s just a kid, maybe no more than sixteen. “Are you kidding me?”

“NOW!”

“I'm stealing this car. Back off!” Gabe tells the kid.

“I'll shoot you, fool,” the kid screams. “I'll blow your brains out!

“Gabe—” Garth starts.

“Gabe, nothin’!” he says and he slams the door open, catching the kid in the stomach and doubling him over. Gabe gets out of the car. “Lazy, disrespectful, half-assed bully. Any asshole can pull a gun.” And he kicks the kid. “You don't know how to steal a car, do you? You gotta take them when there's already a key in them. Scare people.”

“C'mon, Gabe. Let's go,” Garth sounds worried from the passenger seat.

“Lazy. Lazy! I ask you: What's the matter with kids today?” Gabe looks in at Garth, missing the kid lifting the gun. A bullet rips into Gabriel Laufeyson. He staggers and his knees drop to the pavement.

“What did you do?” Garth yells at the kid, getting out of the car and running around it to get to Gabe.

“I don’t know, I don’t know,” the kid cries.

“Get out of here kid,” Gabe tells him, holding his side where blood is seeping through his fingers.

The kid nods once and runs.

They can already hear sirens. “Get outta here. Get out. Now!” Gabe tells Garth.

“I can't leave you here.” Garth tries to put his own hands over Gabe’s, but Gabriel bats them away with his free hand.

“I'm all right. It’s merely a flesh wound. Those sirens are getting closer—they’re going to take me to the hospital. But if you’re still here, they’ll bust the both of us. Go!” 

Garth looks up and around, stands up straight and starts to follow the same way the kid ran off.

“Garth!” Gabe calls. Garth turns back. “Take Bernadene with you.”

“Yeah, yeah right.” Garth nods and returns to the car. “Gimme your radio too,” he says.

“Still in the car, now git.”

Bernadene and Garth are long gone before any police show up. Garth pulls his phone out of his pocket. He doesn’t want to call this in over the radio.

  


.oOo.

  


“Gabriel got shot. Jacker,” Bobby tells Dean after he gets out of his Jennifer.

“How is he?”

“They got him to the hospital. I have a friend there, he's stable,” Bobby says. “Garth’s shook up pretty bad. I don’t think we can send him out anymore.”

“He’s okay though?” Dean confirms and Bobby nods his head over to where Garth is sitting with his hands curled around a steaming cup. “Alright, where does that leave us?”

“Sam and Cole are coming back in from their run out to the Emerald Queen, where they picked up the Stretch Limo and the Dodge Charger on their way back. That leaves us seven ladies,” Bobby says. “I’m going to need you to pick up Susan, as well as Baby.”

“Susan’s the T-Bird right?” Cas asks as he walks over to them, having arrived as they were talking. “I’ll swap you.”

“Ashley’s the only car left, near Susan,” Bobby says. “‘Course if you want to give Dean the Cobra…”

“Hrmm Shelby for a Thunderbird?” Cas muses, “I’ll—”

“Keep the Shelby,” Dean finishes for him. “Susan’s all mine.”

“I thought we were family?” Cas sounds fake hurt.

“Are we family?” Dean jokes.

“We were,” Cas says sadly. “But that was a long time ago.”

“Dean, now’s not the time,” Bobby says.

“Sorry.” Dean reaches up and rubs at the back of his neck.

“I miss you,” Cas whispers

“I’m here now,” Dean takes a step toward Cas.

“And I need you both in Jo’s car,” Bobby interrupts again.

  


.oOo.

  


Benny and Ash call in, they’re heading back with Anne and Sharon as Jo drops Cas and Dean two blocks away from Ashley.

“How are you going to deal with that?” Dean teases, pointing to the steering wheel arm when they arrive.

“Easy,” Cas answers, a ratchet in his hand already. He pulls the entire steering wheel off and replaces it with one he pulls from his tool bag. It’s smaller in diameter but fits perfectly in place. He uses the same ratchet to tighten it. A screwdriver in the ignition and the car’s started. “I love the sixties.”

Dean waits until they’re driving over the 520 bridge before he asks Cas to move over to the outside lane. He winds the window down and throws the original wheel, arm still intact, out like a Frisbee over the balustrade and into the water.

Cas takes the exit into Montlake so Dean can pick up Susan. He risks pulling up in the drive way directly behind the T-Bird, only to have a light turn on in the house next door. Cas and Dean both slide down in the seats they’re in.

The light’s coming from a side window, from its size and shape and the café style lace curtains, Dean assumes it’s the kitchen. “Here’s hoping they’re sleepless and getting warm milk,” he says.

“Seems likely, it’s a bit early for anything else, unless they’re a baker.”

Dean groans. “Don’t remind me,” he says, “that wasn’t my best idea.” His first job, instead of being after school, had been before school at a bakery. Dean thought he’d be learning how to make pies. Instead he’d been waking up at the butt crack of dawn to knead dough and turn out loaves of bread.

He hadn’t lasted long but it’d taught him two very useful skills. The first, obviously, being how to bake bread. He still refuses to buy anything mass produced—and his burgers are entirely on the next level when he makes his own brioche buns.

The second skill being how to mainline coffee. Prior to working at the bakery he’d occasionally drunk a cup filled with creamer and sugar. After the bakery, Dean couldn’t get started in the morning until he’d drunk at least a cup—so black it threatened to melt any spoon waved near it. It’s a skill he maintained.

“Look,” Cas says, pointing to the window.

In it are two women framed by the lace curtains. Standing chest to back, swaying softly side to side. The blonde standing behind has her eyes closed and her nose pressed into the slightly shorter woman’s hair. The brunette seems to be saying something, but Cas and Dean obviously can’t hear her.

The woman standing in front tilts her head back and taller woman kisses her. They break suddenly then seem to laugh, the blonde walks away from the window, then returns. The angle is wrong to see, but her upper body language conveys she’s handing her—lover? Girlfriend? More than just a roommate obviously—something. The brunette lifts a mug up and sips from it, leaving a small milk mustache behind.

“That could have been us,” Dean murmurs.

“They're in love.”

Dean isn’t sure what to say to that, but he opens his mouth and words spill out without him planning them. “I thought we were in love. I still am.”

“You left,” Cas says, his eyes sad. It’s the same conversation they’ve been having since Dean returned.

The light goes out and they sit looking at each other for too long. The radio breaks the silence. It’s Sam’s voice. “Cole’s been shot. Jesus. Fuck. What do I do?”

Oo.oO

A little while earlier…

While Jo was dropping Cas and Dean off in Redmond, Ellen had taken the other four boosters, dropping Benny and Ash off first, then leaving Sam and Cole in the middle of The Highlands with the second transmitter Ash had made earlier in the day to get them in and out of the gated community. After Ellen disappeared around one of the many bends in the road, Sam and Cole moved up the driveway of Kimberley’s house.

The triple garage was wide open, with noises bleeding through from the back yard. A handful of cars littered the circular driveway, evidence of a party earlier in the night. And from the sounds of music playing, there were still people going strong.

Sam pushed Cole towards the Navigator. They didn’t have time, with Gabe and Garth out of the game, to find another Lincoln. They were here now, and Kimberley was right there waiting.

“Sam,” Cole whispered from his spot near a door leading to the rear patio. “Come look at this fire pit. It’s a freaking dragon, man.”

“We don’t have time Cole,” Sam hissed back. He moved to the driver’s door and pulled a slim-jim from his bag. It was meant to be Cole’s boost, but Sam knew they needed to be moving.

He had the door open and one of Ash’s gadgets over the ignition when a young woman stepped into the garage through the door Cole was still standing too close to. “Who are you?” she demanded. “What are you doing?” She looked at Cole, waiting for him to answer.

“Get in the car now!” Sam yelled at him.

“Shit!” The woman stumbled backwards out of the doorway. “Someone call security! They’re stealing Stacey’s mom’s car.”

Sam had Kimberley started and backing out of the garage before Cole finally snapped out of it and dove for door Sam flung open for him.

“Security?” he asked Sam.

“Rent-a-cops. They patrol the whole estate, we need to get out of here.” Sam sped away from the house.

“Take this left,” Cole directed.

“Are you sure?” Sam looked over at him.

“Yes!”

Sam took the corner too fast. He didn’t have the time or space to do anything less.

“No. Shit. I don’t know,” Cole said.

“Fuck it, Cole, you are meant to know these streets!” Sam yelled at him, more so because he knew he wasn’t meant to take that turn, but did so on Cole’s say so.

“There’s only one way in and out of here and all the streets twist and turn back on themselves,” Cole whined.

“We don’t have time for this.” Sam slammed the breaks on and performed the quickest, dirtiest U-turn in his whole history of driving to get them going back in the direction they just came from. The other road was the faster route out, Sam was sure of it.

“Shit,” Cole swore as they spotted the flashing lights ahead of them. “We’re just any other car,” Sam prayed as he bled speed without using the breaks. “Nothing to see here. You just go get to that house.”

The security car passed them and continued on. Sam and Cole’s relief was cut short by the sight of a second car parked sideways over the road in front of them. Two guys in reflective vests waved at Sam to pull over.

“Sorry guys, we don’t have time,” Sam uttered as he mounted the curb and sped around them. One of the guards pulled his gun and fired at the car as it barreled towards and past him. Sam doesn’t ease up, pressing his foot down harder as, not even trying to get the gate to open, he slammed through the wooden barrier.

“Sam,” Cole said. “Sam, I think he got me.”

Sam looked over to see what Cole was talking about and saw blood on his lips, and spreading outward over Cole’s chest. He panicked and grabbed his radio. “Cole’s been shot. Jesus. Fuck. What do I do?”

Oo.oO

“Everyone shut up!” Bobby’s voice takes command. “Where are you Sam?”

“I’m, shit, I don’t know. I’m not that far from I-5. Bobby, there’s a lot of blood. I think it’s bad, Bobby, really bad.”

“Okay, Sam, I need you to hold it together. You get on I-5 and you get back here as fast as you can. I’m going to send Victor to you. You stay on this channel, you got it Sam?”

“Yeah, yeah I got it. Get on I-5, Victor’s coming.”

“Everyone else switch to our backup channel now and sound off.”

Cas looks at Dean then lifts his walkie-talkie and switches to channel 7. “This is Cas.” He hands it to Dean. “Check in Dean.”

“This is Benny.”

“Ash here.”

“Jo.”

“Dean.” He says his name and hands the radio back to Cas, leaving his own on the original channel.

“Ellen.”

“Charlie here.”

“Okay, everyone stick to the plan, finish what you’re doing. Victor’s going to meet up with Sam and get Cole help,” Bobby tells them. “It’s not going to do Sam any good for the rest of us to drop the ball now. Where are you all? Cas?”

“I’ve just left Dean with Susan,” he lies—they’re both still sitting in the Shelby.

“Dean?”

Cas hands Dean his radio again. “I, uh, I pulled over.” Dean keeps his eyes on Cas. “Have you got this? I’m not far from I-5. I’m closer than Victor.”

“I know son, but Victor’s not bringing Susan home. You need to do that okay?” Bobby’s voice is soft.

“Okay, I’m coming in.” Dean hands the radio back to Cas and they ignore it as Benny and Ash update their positions. “Cas…”

“I know, but we need to finish this.” Cas leans over and gently kisses Dean.

Like a starving man who has been given food, Dean devours Cas. Cas lets him knowing that right now Dean needs every connection he can get. If Cole was shot, Sam was being fired at too.

Dean pulls back abruptly. “Shit, I’m sorry Cas,” he says, rubbing at his lips.

Cas doesn’t try to placate Dean, rather he tells him, “It’s okay.”

“Thank you,” Dean’s voice is full of emotion. Fear, stress, worry and most deadly, hope.

“I’m on I-5 heading south,” Sam calls from Dean’s radio.

“Dean, you need to trust Bobby and Victor now,” Cas tells him. “Turn your radio to channel 7. They have this, they’re not going to let anything happen to Sam.”

Dean looks down at the radio in his hand and reluctantly turns it to the new channel. He sighs and looks at Cas. “We need to talk,” he says and reaches over, hooking his finger through the chain Cas is wearing around his neck. Dean pulls on it slowly, drawing it out from under Cas’ shirt until his father’s wedding band is exposed.

“We will,” Cas says and tucks the warm ring back under his clothes to sit next to his heart.

Dean gets out of the Shelby and Cas lets it roll back out of the driveway. He looks at the man he never stopped loving, as Cas starts the engine and pulls away.

  


.oOo.

  


“A man was admitted to hospital earlier tonight with a gunshot wound,” Detective Hanscum says as she walks into the office she shares with Detective Mills.

“And?” Jody asks.

“A couple of uniforms were sent to get a statement, but he was already in surgery when they arrived,” Donna says. “Anywho, since he was in surgery and couldn’t be interviewed the hospital handed his clothing over for evidence—”

“Get to the point,” Jody interrupts.

Donna holds a piece of paper out for Jody. “They found this in his pocket. I can’t make any sense of it, but maybe you should have a look.”

“I'm getting reports every five minutes,” Jody exaggerates the timing but not the amount of work that’s been pouring in.

Donna waggles the sheet enticingly. “The man who was shot was Gabriel Laufeyson.”

“Details,” Jody asks as she takes the sheet of paper.

“Some car-jacker. It was a through and through, hit the spleen. The surgery’s to remove it.”

“Holy shit!” Jody stands up. “Do you know what you just handed me?” She holds the faxed page in one hand while she shuffles paper around on her desk.

“It’s a list of names and intersections.”

“This is a shopping list.” Jody hands the pile of reports she’s just created to Donna, with the list on top, but doesn’t let go of them. “Start cross checking all of these, but right now I need you to get a car out to this location.” Jody points to a line about a fifth of the way down the list.

“What for?”

“Because Dean’s going to leave that one for last.” She pulls her finger back from the word Baby.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean turns his walkie-talkie back to Sam’s channel as soon as he’s gotten back on 520. He listens to Sam and Victor sound off their locations as they get closer and closer, finally agreeing to meet at Roanoke Park. Dean hits his steering wheel in frustration, screaming his anguish. He’d just been right there. He’d been five minutes from Roanoke when Sam told them Cole was shot.

Now, Dean’s almost back at the barn. “Bobby,” Victor’s voice sounds pained. “I have Cole, I’ve told Sam to switch to seven and sent him on with Kimberley.”

“How does the kid look?” Bobby asks.

“Jesus Bobby, they’re all kids. Sam’s shaken, Cole’s… He’s not looking good. I’m headed to the hospital, but I don’t know if he’s going to make it.”

“Try.”

“I am trying, god helps us all, I’m trying—” Dean cuts Victor off by switching channels.

“Damnit Dean answer me.” It’s Cas yelling over channel seven.

“You should be able to see me,” he answers as he turns into pier 25. He sees Cas step out of the building Bobby’s been holed up in all night, followed by Ellen and Jo. Dean pulls up beside them and ignores Roman’s goon who gets in the abandoned T-Bird, driving it away to be packed in a container.

Dean steps into Cas’ arms. “You were meant to stay with me,” Cas says.

“Never meant to leave you,” Dean mutters into his neck. He’s not sure if he meant the radio channel or six years ago. Both. Yet it had been his choice both times to move away. “I need to see Sam.” He draws away from Cas just far enough to look into his eyes.

“I know,” Cas answers.

“Benny’s inside, Ash is two minutes out,” Ellen speaks up. “Jo’ll take them and Garth back to the garage. We’ll wait for Sam.”

  


.oOo.

  


Eight minutes after Jo leaves with Ash, Benny and Garth, Bobby’s phone rings. He answers it and immediately Dean’s pressing his ear up against the hand holding it to Bobby’s ear. “Bobby, you there?”

“Yeah Victor.”

“Are you alone?”

“Fuck,” Bobby says, his eyes meeting Cas’ who is hovering near Dean.

“Yeah,” Victor sighs. “They have him now, but I’m pretty sure he died before I got here.”

“Can you get back?” Bobby asks, but Dean can hear the sound of a car pulling up outside and he hurries out.

  


.oOo.

  


Sam pulls up in Kimberley and the look of relief on his face when he sees Dean waiting for him is palpable.

“Come here,” Dean says as he steps forward, and Sam does. He walks to Dean and Dean puts his arms around his little brother. And that's it. The floodgates open. Sam begins to sob. Deep, painful, racking sobs.

“I've missed you,” Sam says.

“I know. I've missed you, too.” Dean rubs Sam’s back the same way he did when their father died and Sam was eight. Cas, Ellen and Bobby stand in the doorway, all wanting to support Sam, but wanting to give the brothers time as well.

“Cole?” Sam asks and he sounds so young Dean’s heart breaks.

He tries to answer but ends up making some choked sound instead.

“Victor got him to Harborview, but he didn’t make it.” Bobby tells him from the doorway. Ellen steps forward and envelopes both of them in her arms.

Cas and Bobby join in and the four of them stand around Sam until Dean unwraps Sam's arms from around him.

“Stay here. Stay here a while. I'll be back,” Dean says. Sam nods, sniffling. Dean walks back into the office Bobby has commandeered and checks the clipboard with the list of cars. Coming back out, he taps Ellen on the arm. “Give me a ride?”

“Where to?” she asks.

“Sam's not clear yet. Cas and I have work to do.” Dean leaves his brother with Bobby while he and Cas climb into Ellen’s van.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s sitting in the passenger seat of a 2002 996 Turbo X50. Cas pulls up next to the hotel’s driveway. “So, you seeing anybody?” Cas asks, too casually.

“No. I had a guy. He was great.”

“If he was so great, why'd you leave him?”

“You should know… Walking away from my mother, my brother, this town? It was hard. But walking away from you? Nearly killed me.” Dean looks over at Cas.

“I—” he stops and, turning towards Dean, grabs his hand and squeezes it. “You ready?”

“Yeah, let’s kick it in the ass.”

Cas watches as Dean gets out of the car and jogs into the parking garage before he merges back into the pre-dawn traffic.

  


.oOo.

  


Inside the parking garage Dean finds Baby. He caresses her curves as he moves to her door. The slim-jim slides in smoothly and, with a quick jerk and a soft sigh from Dean, she’s unlocked.

Her door doesn’t squeak when Dean pulls her open. He gets his first good look at her interior and he wants to cry. Some monster has pulled out her bench seat, dropped four in the floor and installed bucket seats. What’s worse, her original tape deck has been removed and she’s now sporting a CD-radio combo. The cassette in Dean’s pocket is useless.

Dean slips into the driver’s seat, his hands running over all reachable surfaces. “Oh Baby, what have they done to you?” 

  


.oOo.

  


Mills and Hanscum are sitting on the street watching the driveway of an apartment building when they see Cas drive past in a Porsche.

Jody nudges Donna, who lifts a pair of binoculars so she can clearly read the license plate as it drives away.

“This is one-baker-eleven,” she identifies herself on the radio held in her other hand. “Run a tag for me. WA plates, XJB-953.” They wait, not moving from where they’re parked.

The radio crackles to life. “One-baker-eleven. Plate x-ray juliette bravo 9-5-3 is not wanted.”

“Something doesn’t feel right,” Jody says. Donna looks back over her shoulder, binoculars still raised to shoulder height. “Jodes, check it out.” She points back down the direction of 8th avenue.

An Impala has appeared at the top of the Hyatt’s garage ramp. Jody squints. “Give me the binoculars,” she says, holding her hand out.

Donna passes them over. “What do you think?”

“Tough to tell.”

The car pulls out and joins the stream of traffic.

“We need to make a decision,” Donna says.

“There are no coincidences,” Jody replies as she hits the lights and sirens.

Dean sees the car behind him. “Shit,” he curses and kicks Baby into gear.

“Hey, now!” Donna calls out, and the race is on.

“This is one-baker-eleven in pursuit of a 1967 Chevy Impala, Illinois license plate E62-3015. Repeat: Echo 6-2 3-0-1-5.” Jody makes the same hard left the Impala in front of her does and Donna continues speaking. “Westbound on Olive way, against traffic.”

The police dispatch replies. “Switch to open channel three. All units stand-by.”

Dean looks back over his shoulder and sees Jody closing in fast. He swerves around an oncoming car, then back again to dodge another. He swears, breaks hard and turns into an alleyway.

He reaches down and turns on the radio, hoping for music since his mixtape is out of the equation.

A song is coming to the end “And that was Puddle of Mud’s _‘She Hates Me’_. You’re listening to Balthazar for Breakfast and this is _‘Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous’_ by Good Charlotte.”

“Kill me now,” Dean says as the songs intro starts. He blows through Stewart and turns down Westlake, from there he ducks and weaves his way through Seattle’s grid, picking up more and more police cars.

There are too many on his tail to be able to head to the pier so he doubles back onto 4th and heads north, back through the city center.

“This is Balthazar for Breakfast and we're getting reports of a big police chase. Apparently it just went past our humble studios. We'll keep you posted.” The radio switches to Eminem’s _‘Superman’_.

“Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me,” Dean yells out, but to be honest it could be directed at either the radio or the police pouring out of the station on the corner of 4th and Cherry, piling into the line of cruisers parked there.

He plants his foot and Baby leaps forward. The song mutes on the radio as Balthazar speaks over it. “I’m looking at footage coming in from our weather chopper and I have to tell you, this boy can drive! You go Bandit.”

Dean grunts, shaking his head, and flips open the center console, reaching in to open the valve in there. He swings wide for a moment, cutting across all lanes of traffic to make the right turn on to University street with its onramp to I-5’s express lanes.

There are two helicopters over his head. One must be the weather chopper Balthazar was talking about, making the other a police chopper. He’s going to have to lose that. He pulls his phone out and dials.

  


.oOo.

  


Balthazar’s coordinating producer comes into his booth. “Some guy's on the phone for you, Bal. Claims to be the Bandit.”

Balthazar scrambles to connect the call to his headset. “Hello? Is this the Bandit?”

“Yes, it is.” The voice is deep.

Balthazar holds his hands up in a worshipful motion, thanking God he’d cut into the last song to take this call. “How you doing, man?”

“The truth is, my car here doesn't have a tape deck. You mind hooking me with up with some driving tunes?” the voice asks him.

“You got it, Bandit.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean hangs up and turns the radio up. “This one’s going out to The Boss Barracuda.” Balthazar’s voice fills the car. “Catch him if you can—” And he plays Ram Jam’s _‘Black Betty’_.

Dean smiles as he takes the sweeping left turn onto the express way. As he straightens out Dean hits the two buttons on the steering wheel and lets the nitrous oxide push him back into the bucket seat.

  


.oOo.

  


Jody and Donna watch as the Impala in front of them disappears, their pursuit vehicle having no way to keep up with it.

“Someone tell me we still have eyes on that car,” Jody screams into the radio.

“This is an A-Star sir, not an Apache.”

“All units. Pursuit has been terminated. Repeat: pursuit has been terminated.” The call comes over the police radio. Someone higher up the command chain has determined continuing the chase is too high risk.

“God damn it!” Jody slaps the steering wheel in frustration.

“Man this guy can drive,” Donna says in admiration.

“What?” Jody asks, turning to her partner then yells, “WHAT?”

“It's probably,” Donna says, “mostly the car...”

Jody picks up the radio and issues orders to start sweeping from Lower Queen Anne down to the International District. From the Sound to Lake Washington. “I want every car on the road driving the grid looking for that car. His drop off point has to be around here somewhere. He’ll be back.”

“Who is this fudging guy?” Donna asks, but Jody gives her the stink eye in lieu of answering.

  


.oOo.

  


Back at Bobby’s they’re all grouped around one of Charlie’s laptops. She’s hacked into the same feed Balthazar was watching in his studio. They look between themselves and Garth says what they’re all thinking. “It’s too hot. He’s not going to be able to get to the dock.”

Jo reaches over and grabs Charlie’s arm. “Don’t worry sweetie, Dean’s going to be fine. He’ll slip his tail and get away.”

None of them notice Sam slipping out the door.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean lets himself into Dick Roman’s workshop. The casket for Sam rests to one side. Roman’s using a router to make a rebate along the bottom frame of a pinewood gossip bench. He senses something and turns.

“Well, well. You've caused quite a ruckus.”

“This is number fifty.” Dean points back to Baby parked outside the workshop but still visible through the open door. “We did it. It's over. Where's the money?”

Roman’s smile is pure oil. “Right there.” He gestures to a leather briefcase. Dean opens it. There's a lot of cash inside. “200k. Just like we said.”

“You should never have gotten my brother and his friends involved,” Dean tells him.

“But I had to. It was the only way to get to you,” Roman tells him.

Dean glares at him. Roman’s smile turns feral.

“Well, now he's clear. And you'll stay away from him.”

“I don't know about that, Dean. He did such a good job on this paper. And another one just came in,” he says, picking up a sheet of paper from one of the work benches lining the room. “It's an easier take. Thirty cars. Three weeks. Most of them are SUVs. Going to Russia. Think Sam'll be interested?”

“You don't want to joke about that,” Dean says, closing the case and picking it up.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Roman asks.

“What do you mean?”

"Fifty cars, Dean. Not forty-nine.”

“You have your fifty cars. It's over.”

“Fifty cars by 8am Friday delivered to pier 25, or Sam goes in the box. That was the deal. That car out there,” Roman points to Baby, “that’s not at the dock getting loaded on the ship. And it’s already,” he looks down at his watch, “seven thirty-two. And you have all of Seattle’s PD out in force.”

Dean’s standing by a table saw. He places the brief case on the floor and flicks the saw on. The electric motor grumbles to life, obscuring any noises.

“What’re you doing?” Dick asks, moving towards the saw.

“Tell you what I'm not doing—I'm not letting you get anywhere near Sam ever again.”

Dean throws himself at Dick, pulling him down to the ground. They roll about, eddies of sawdust swirling up into the air. The noise of the table saw drowns out their sounds of combat.

Roman is able to get on top and grabs a chisel that’s been knocked to the floor. He swings it down towards Dean's face. Dean grabs hold of Roman's wrist, straining, the lethal point inches from his eye.

Dean looks around desperately as Roman bears down, pushing the chisel closer and closer to Dean’s eye. But he’s shifting his weight and isn’t pinning Dean as well as he should. And Dean’s spotted a floor socket to his left.

Dean twists his hips, throwing Roman sideways and directing his hands towards the socket. The chisel plunges in and Roman’s hands slip down the wooden handle and onto the metal.

Both men freeze as a bang is heard from the fuse box and the table saw’s motor dies.

Dean recovers first and grabs a loop of extension cable, pulling it around Dick Roman’s neck. He pulls it tight, wiggling a knee into the middle of Roman’s back.

Dick claws at the cable around his throat. He tries to scream, but he doesn’t have any air left in his lungs. Victor appears in the doorway.

“Jesus, man. What'd you do?” he asks, pulling Dean from the limp body.

But before Dean can respond, they hear an approaching engine through the still open doorway, and from where Dean is crouched he can see a panel van arriving. Dean and Victor look at the wall-clock. 7:41. They look back at the unconscious Roman.

“Now you’ve done it. And with you gone—who'll save Sam the next time?”

“This is all about there not being a next time,” he says, holding Victor’s look. Outside the van doors slam as Edgar and Chet, Roman's grave-diggers, get out.

Victor gets his arms under the unconscious Roman and picks him up, straining under the dead weight. Dragging the body over to the open casket. “A little help here, Dean.” The two of them pick Roman up and drop him into the casket. “Get in the office and hide.” Victor doesn’t watch as Dean retreats, concentrating instead on adding the decorative wingnuts to the casket.

He looks up as Edgar and Chet enter the workshop. “Hey, gimme a hand here,” he orders them, placing the remaining wingnuts in the center of the casket’s lid.

“What happened? Did they make it?” Chet asks as he steps forward and helps Victor lock the casket closed.

“They did not. A tragedy really,” Victor mutters, moving to the next wingnut.

“Roman around?” Edgar looks around the workshop like he’s expecting their boss to appear.

“He's napping. He said to take it away.” Victor gestures to the coffin. 

Chet finishes tightening the final nut and calls Edgar over to help. They pick it up and with great difficulty move towards the door.

Victor steps forward and grabs the corner next to Edgar. “I think this was the end with the head,” he grunts as he helps them carry the coffin out to the van.

“Thanks for the help, Vic. Tell Roman we were by,” Edgar says as he gets into the driver’s side.

“Absolutely.” Victor watches as they drive away, before returning to the workshop. Not seeing Dean, he enters Roman’s office but finds that empty too. “Damnit Dean, where are you?”

There’s the sound of a body hitting the ground as Dean falls out from where he’d wedged himself up under Roman’s desk.

“How’d you even fit up under there?” Victor asks in shock.

“I really don’t know, but desperate times,” Dean answers.

“Get outta here Dean,” Victor says.

Nodding, he goes to walk past Victor, but stops and hugs him tight. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it. Really, don’t mention it to anyone.” Victor pounds Dean on the back a couple of times and pushes him at the door.

Dean leaves the workshop carrying the briefcase. As he’s about to open the rear door of the Chevy he stole earlier, another ‘67 Impala drives into the lot. Another Baby, this one with a ‘For Sale’ sign in her back window.

“What are you doing here?” Dean asks Sam as he pulls up beside him.

“I saw the chase on the TV. I didn’t know if you were going to make it.”

“Where'd you find this one?” Dean asks, looking her over. She’s a beat up mess, while most of her panels look okay, if a little sun crazed. Her interior—original by the looks of it—is a torn and shredded mess.

“You gotta keep tabs on your ‘Babys’, Dean. You never know when you're gonna need one.” Sam slides his hand over the warped dash.

“You boost her?” Dean asks, opening the driver’s door to get a better look inside.

“Hell, yeah,” Sam says. “She's not my unicorn.”

“Move over.”

Sam slides across the bench seat taking a strip of the seats padding with him. Dean gets in behind the wheel. Seeing the tape deck he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his mixtape. He pushes it in and sighs in pleasure as Led Zeppelin’s _‘Ramble On’_ starts playing.

  


.oOo.

  


“You okay?” Dean asks his brother.

“I don’t know. I keep thinking about Cole,” Sam replies.

Dean nods and is about to reassure Sam when the sound of a siren and flashing lights draw his attention. Dean considers his options. He could make another run. But he looks at Sam, enough is enough. He pulls over.

“What are you doing? You can outrun that.” Sam’s voice is full of the contempt he feels for the state’s police cars.

“It's over.” Dean shakes his head. “All this dumb shit is over.”

The unmarked car pulls up behind him. It is, of course, Detective Mills who climbs out of the car and walks up to Dean’s window.

“I know you,” she says.

“You know my back,” Dean replies.

“It's finished, Dean. Get out of the car,” Jody tells him. “You, too, kid.”

Dean opens his door to get out, when Mills’ radio starts transmitting. “We have suspect vehicle matching description at Roman’s Scrap and Metal. Repeat: The suspect vehicle has been apprehended at Roman’s Scrap and Metal, corner of North 97th street and Midvale avenue north.”

Jody Mills frowns and walks back to her car. Dean looks at Sam.

“I reported it.”

Dean looks impressed. “Not bad.”

Jody pulls the radio from her car and speaks into it. “Dispatch, this is one-baker-eleven. What's the license on the suspect vehicle?”

“License is Illinois E-6-2-3-0-1-5. Repeat: Illinois. Echo 6-2-3-0-1-5.

Jody looks over at Donna still sitting in the passenger seat. “KAZ 2Y5,” Donna reads the plate of the car parked in front of them.

Jody works her mouth for a bit then says into the radio, “Ten-four.” She hands it back into the car where Donna takes it from her hand, then walks slowly back to Dean. “Looks like you live to fight another round. You're free to go.”

Dean’s smile is bright enough to light the whole of Seahawks Stadium. Mills leans down to speak to Sam. “Your brother's a clever man and a talented thief, Sam. But as role models go, you should observe the man, not the thief.”

“Yes ma’am,” he agrees.

Jody sighs.

“Don't look so glum, Detective.” Dean’s still grinning. “It's a beautiful day, the birds are singing, and there's a container ship at Pier 25 which is guaranteed to bring you happiness and joy.”

Jody narrows her eyes. “I want you gone, Dean. Settle your affairs. Make it right with those you love. Hell, take ‘em with you. But I want you out of here.” She takes a breath. “Out of here for good this time.”

“Consider me gone,” he says.

“I'll catch you later, Dean.”

“Double-meaning intended?” he asks.

She raises two fingers and taps them to her forehead, saluting him as Dean drives away.

  


.oOo.

  


Dean and Sam pull into Bobby’s garage, the main door wide open and waiting for them. In the break room they find Bobby, Benny and Ellen sipping glasses of whisky. They’re exhausted. 

Dean hands Bobby the briefcase. He opens it and Ellen whistles lowly, eyeing all the cash.

“Any word on Gabriel?”

“He's going to be okay. Could end up doing a stint.”

Dean looks around the room. The guys from Sam’s crew are huddled together in the corner and he can see Charlie and Jo asleep on the couch in Bobby’s office. “What happened to Cas?”

“He left kiddo,” Ellen tells him.

Dean nods stiffly. He reaches out and pulls an empty glass towards himself, when he hears Garth speaking softly to Sam.

“Poor Cole,” he’s saying. The room stills as they all remember.

The silence is broken by Benny. “If his premature demise has, in some way, enlightened the rest of you as to the grim finish below the glossy veneer of criminal life, and inspired you to change your ways, then his death carries with it an inherent nobility,” he says. “And a supreme glory. We should all be so fortunate. You say ‘Poor Cole.’ I say, ‘poor us.’”

They all stare at him, stunned. 

Garth breaks the silence. “So that’s it?” he asks.

“What do you mean?” Dean responds, pouring a shot of whisky into the glass in front of him.

“Is that it?” Garth asks again, looking around at the crew. “We only delivered 49 ladies to the dock. The deal was for 50. Roman may have paid us but surely someone is going to be pissed the order is one lady short?”

Dean slowly turns the shot glass on the bench, watching the play of light on the golden liquid.

“If the buyer is upset, they’re going to take it up with Roman, not us. And Dick has…” Dean pauses. “Gone to ground. Anyway, if Detective Mills does her job, the order is never going to make it to the buyer and she is going to be far too busy chasing bigger fish to worry about us. We’re just the hired help. So long as we keep our heads down, we’re good.”

He goes to pick up the shot glass, but Sam’s hand claims it.

“You need to go to him,” Sam says. There’s no question as to who he means.

“What’s the split? Twelve equal shares?” Dean asks the room.

“Sixteen thousand, six hundred and sixty six dollars, sixty seven cents for the eight of us. Sixty six cents for our four support crew,” Ash reels off easily.

Dean reaches into the briefcase and pulls out a ten-thousand-dollar stack of bills. “See that the rest of my share gets to me?” he asks Bobby, who nods in agreement. He hands the money he pulled out to Sam. “You remember where you got this Baby?”

“Sure,” he says.

“She's for sale. The sign says they're asking for seven thousand. Give ‘em the ten.”

“You want me to buy her?” Sam says, looking down at the bills in his hand.

“Shocking, huh? We're clear now. It's done,” Dean says. “I've never actually paid for a car. I wanna see what it feels like.”

Sam nods. Dean looks at a grinning Bobby who says, “Dinosaurs. All of us. The Ice Age is now.”

“I have somewhere I need to be,” Dean says. Ellen tells him where he can find Cas. Dean tips his head and heads for Baby.

“Hey, Dean?” Sam jogs out after him. “I'll see you, right?”

“Yeah, Sammy, you'll see me.” Dean pulls him in for a hug.

  


.oOo.

  


Cas is underneath a ‘64 Shelby Daytona coupé when Dean finds him at his day job. He reaches down and, putting his hands on Cas’ waist, gently pulls him out from underneath the car. Cas squawks in outrage when he starts moving and he looks ready to swing as he comes out from under the car. Dean’s not sure what stops him.

“What are you doing?” Cas asks, letting Dean pull him to his feet.

“Seeing if you wanted to come for a ride,” he states confidently, pulling the rag from Cas’ pocket and tenderly wiping a small black smear of oil from his cheek.

“I can't. I’ve got a backlog of repairs and one of the other mechanics called in sick. And I haven't slept and—” Cas stops when he sees Baby outside. He licks his lips. “Where to?”

“I got a place up north,” Dean says shyly.

Cas looks at him, long and hard. “This time it's for real?”

Dean hesitantly lifts his hand and, projecting his movements, waits for Cas to stop him, but he doesn’t. He slips a finger under Cas’ collar and pulls the chain out until the silver halo ring is resting against Dean’s finger. Slowly he leans forward and kisses Cas chastely. “For real.”

“Wait here,” Cas says as he moves back a step.

Dean nods, then reaches a gentle hand to Cas’ shoulder.

“What about Mick?” Dean asks.

“Mick?” Cas quirks as eyebrow.

“Yeah, Mick. Aren’t you two…?” He leaves the sentence hanging, not wanting to finish.

“Mick knew the score when he left. I’m pretty sure he saw this,” Cas waves a hand that somehow encompasses both Dean and Baby, “coming. He wanted me to be free to choose my own way.”

Dean swallows hard and watches as the love of his life walks away from him, baggy overalls hiding every distinguishing feature other than his wild, untamable hair.

A short time later Cas reappears dressed in the same clothes he’s been wearing all night. He stops and speaks to one of his co-workers, clearly not trying to hide their conversation. “Inias, I just quit. I’m so sorry to leave you in the pits by yourself but my guy came back.”

The dark haired co-worker looks over at Dean and Dean gives him a small wave.

Cas hands him a set of keys. “Can you look after my bike for a few days?”

“Cas, you know I’m always happy to help you out. But are you sure about him?”

Cas turns and looks at Dean, a big gummy smile on his face. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m sure.”

  


.oOo.

  


Dean’s driving with Cas riding shotgun. Seattle at their backs. They only stop long enough for Cas to grab a bag of clothes and to see Mary and say… not goodbye, but to say they couldn’t wait for her and Sam to come and visit.

Cas watches Dean. He looks so enthralled behind Baby’s wheel. It’s obvious he loves this car.

“What?” Dean looks over at him.

“Nothing,” Cas says. “Just that if I was less secure, I might think you love Baby more than you love me.”

“She does have one thing you don't,” Dean looks back at him again, grinning.

“What's that?” Cas lets ire leak into his voice.

“Bench seats,” he says, patting the seat beside him. Cas carefully slides across and Dean throws his arm around him.


	9. EPILOGUE

The two detectives, Jody Mills and Donna Hanscum, hold on to the railing of the Coast Guard cutter. They’re chasing down the giant freighter which had already left dock before they’d been able to get to it. Actually, since the US Coast Guard can board and search any vessel without probable cause or a warrant, it’s working in Jody’s favor to have them involved.

Their boarding party is armed and armored and the two women are reminded again by the cutter’s captain they’ll need to go below and wait for the all clear before they’re allowed to board and witness any arrests made.

  


.oOo.

  


In a deserted landfill, Edgar uses a bulldozer to dig as deep hole as he can at the base of a mountain of rubbish. Finally satisfied, he walks back to the van and, with Chet’s directions, he reverses it right up to the end of the hole.

Chet climbs into the back of the van through the side door, while Edgar makes his way between the seats. There’s a knocking from inside the casket. Someone, Sam or Dean presumably, is pounding away in there. They can hear muffled screams but Dick’s woodworking skills mean they can’t hear what the poor guy’s screaming. Chet looks at Edgar, horrified.

“What should we do?” Chet asks, staring down at the casket.

“We do what we always do,” Edgar says.

“Shit. I hate the screamers, man,” Chet says. “Why can't Roman finish the freakin’ job?” He reaches for one of the wingnuts.

“Forget about it,” Edgar slaps his hand away from it. “Occupational hazard. C'mon.” He gets his boot planted in the middle of the casket and pushes against the seats.

For a moment it looks like they’re going to push it straight out of the van and into the grave. But at the last moment, while it tilts drunkenly over the edge, Edgar and Chet move down the van to the sides of the coffin.

The unseen occupant is going crazy inside of it and almost causes them to lose their grip as they haul it out and allow it to drop down into the trench Edgar made.

“Move the van,” Edgar orders as he jumps out and walks to the dozer. “I’ll fill this in and move the trash around.” He climbs into the bright yellow piece of equipment and begins dumping shovelfuls of earth as soon as the van is out of the way. The thumping, pounding and yelling are soon gone as the casket is covered in dirt.

Edgar then skillfully causes the leading edge of the trash pile to cascade down over the gravesite, hiding all evidence they were ever there. He drives the dozer back to where they originally found it and he climbs back into the Van. “So, lunch?”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all so much for reading this, and please remember to check out the rest of the Supernatural Movie Big Bang fics via the [collection.](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SPNMovieBigBang2019)
> 
> I can be found on the ProfoundBond Discord server which you can find [here.](http://discord.profoundbond.net/)
> 
> Lastly please spare a moment to follow this link to the [trailer on Youtube](https://youtu.be/p4op0Y8R3EY) and give it a thumbs up, bonus you'll get to watch it again.


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